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THE SIX-POINTED CROSS 
IN THE DUST 


BY 

JOHN ROLAND 

AUTHOR OF “THE GOOD SHEPHERD” 


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NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 






























































































































































































































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THE SIX-POINTED CROSS IN THE DUST 
















THE SIX-POINTED CROSS 
IN THE DUST 


BY 

JOHN ROLAND 

AUTHOR OF ‘‘THE GOOD SHEPHERD” 

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NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 


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Copyright, 1915, by 
Frederick A. Stokes Company 


All rights reserved, including that of translation into 
foreign languages. 


MAY 29 1915 

© Cl. A 4 0 1179 

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THE SIX-POINTED CROSS 
IN THE DUST 


INTRODUCTION 

THE STRANGER AT THE VILLAGE WELL 

“If you dare to ask me any more impertinent questions, 
I shall call my father. ’ ’ 

Kurt’s cheeks flushed. He was very angry; hut his 
lips trembled, and he looked far from comfortable. The 
Stranger tossed back a mass of long black hair from his 
high forehead. 

‘ ‘ I have asked nothing wrong , 9 9 he said kindly. 
‘ ‘ And I knew what you would answer before you spoke . 9 ’ 

‘ ‘ And pray how do you happen to know so much about 
me?” demanded Kurt with quick uneasy suspicion. 

“An hour ago I passed the cabinetmaker’s window; 
he had a piece of apprentice-work on exhibition there, a 
wall cupboard, most cleverly designed. On a card at- 
tached to it I read: ‘Kurt Wiegant, First Prize.’ Then 
you loitered down here to the well, dressed in your best 
black clothes and on a Monday morning. You were 
evidently celebrating the end of your apprenticeship. 
So I put you and the cupboard together, and guessed 
your name. ’ ’ 

“But five others of my comrades were made journey- 
men to-day. Why do you single me out for your ques- 
tions. ’ ’ 

“Because I have an offer to make. Now that you are 
your own master, you will soon be starting off on your 
wander-year. But you are young yet, and you won’t 
find life easy on the road. You will meet much good 


2 


The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


there and much evil. Which of the two you choose as 
your companion will depend on the clearness of your 
eyesight. And I have an idea that you are still more 
than half blind. Let me teach you to see. Come back 
here to the well this afternoon and we can take the road 
together. Besides, I should like to hear something more 
about that prize cupboard of yours.” 

Kurt drew away and avoided the Stranger’s eyes. 

“But I am not going on my wander-year,” he pro- 
tested. “At least, not yet. As the best apprentice I 
have a right to a well-paid place in the master’s shop. 
That’s why I worked so hard for the prize. I want to 
stay at home.” 

“Nevertheless, you had better come with me.” 

“With you? Why, for all your fine words, you’re 
nothing but an idle vagabond. And my father would 
be furious if he caught me even talking with you here.” 

“Your father’s name is Fridolin, is it not? I thought 
so. Go home now and tell him what I have proposed. 
He will remember me if you mention the fortifications 
of Paris and the Six-Pointed-Cross-in-the-Dust. Run 
along. I shall expect you here before sundown.” 

When the apprentice had disappeared around the 
corner of a narrow street, the Stranger seated himself 
on the broad ledge of the old well that stood in the cen- 
ter of the market-place. It was an hour after mid-day ; 
the little shops surrounding the square lay silent in the 
cool shadows at the back of their stone arcades, and all 
outdoor life had ceased: for, after a heavy dinner, the 
townspeople shunned the hot sun that streamed over the 
worn gray figure of their patron Saint, who looked pa- 
tiently down from a pillar into the deep basin of the 
ancient marble fountain. 

The Stranger seemed to enjoy the unbroken stillness. 
He drew from his knapsack a square of black bread and 
dipped it into the clear fresh water at his side. 

Bread and water! Enough for any man. How curi- 
ous it was even to think of the days when he could not 
exist without two heavy meals. He rolled back the 
sleeve of his patched jacket; the white flesh of his arm 


The Stranger at the Village Well 3 

was firm, and beneath it rippled the powerful muscles. 
His simple diet had not weakened him. On the con- 
trary. And he thanked Italy for that lesson. 

As soon as he had eaten his bread he brought out a 
threaded needle, and neatly mended a slight tear in his 
stocking. His clothes were old without being ragged, 
made of the tough Tirolean leather that wears shiny and 
soft, and that fits a man like a second skin. While he 
was sewing, a little child came tripping across the square, 
carrying a bucket; she thought herself alone, and sang 
as she came. The Stranger looked up when she had 
filled her pail, and he bade God guard her. Frightened 
by the unknown voice, she darted away with a faint 
scream, spilling the water over her feet. 

The Stranger sighed. He loved children. 

The market-place of the small Bavarian town faded 
from before his eyes; he saw himself again in a quiet 
garden, dotted with glistening statues; he heard the 
sound of children’s laughter, and felt the touch of their 
warm soft hands. All this had once been his. . . . Once 
— before those terrible things had happened, the things 
that lay between him and his former life like impassable 
chains of snow-capped mountains. He stretched out his 
arms and let them fall again. How long ago that all was ; 
how many, many years ago ! Although his strength was 
still unbroken, there were strands of gray in the masses of 
his black hair, little wrinkles at the corners of his keen 
dark eyes. He was changed; and if he went back he 
would find change in everything. No : he could never go 
back — never. The close smells of a house would stifle him 
now; he had slept too much in the open. Under the 
stars or out in the rain it was all one to him so long as he 
could fill his lungs with clean free air. 

He caught the sound of slow steps and looked up 
again. 

An old couple was tottering towards the well, seeking 
a sunny spot, where they might warm the thin blood that 
ran slow and cold in their stiffening limbs. The shriv- 
elled dame helped her husband to find a comfortable place 
on the fountain’s edge, directly under the staring eyes of 


4 


The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


the stone saint on his pillar ; then she huddled close to his 
side ; and there they sat together, blinking in the hot sun, 
and motionless save for the incessant working of their 
toothless jaws. The Stranger wished them a pleasant 
afternoon. But they were both deaf ; they neither heard 
his greeting nor saw his face. 

Old — old! Some day he too would be helpless and 
broken ; even worse off, perhaps, than these two creatures, 
for he might be all alone. Their nearness made the 
heavy silence distasteful, and he began to feel depressed. 
He must have a companion once more. That was evident. 

He had done well to stop at the cabinetmaker’s shop 
that morning, and to shake hands with the master, whom 
he had once met as a traveling journeyman in years gone 
by. It was from him that he had heard of Kurt Wiegant 
and of his suspected dishonesty. 

“Kurt has no will of his own,” the cabinetmaker had 
said. “Once he gets away from his father’s big fist he’ll 
go to the dogs. But I don’t want to keep him here in 
my shop. A thieving apprentice never made an honest 
journeyman yet.” 

Yielding to a sudden impulse, the Stranger had begged 
the master to do nothing until he himself had spoken 
with the boy. Even then he had felt sorry for Kurt ; and 
now that he had seen him, he felt sorrier still. 

Why should he not find the companion that he needed, 
and do a good work at the same time? He could show 
Kurt the world as a wise man sees and uses it for his 
own ends; the boy’s weak will would find proper exer- 
cise and grow strong: while for himself, life would be 
less lonely than it had been these past six months since 
Francois died. 

Poor Francois! the dare-devil deserter, whom he had 
met near the Belgian frontier, and who had wandered 
with him for over a year, whistling, jesting, drinking, 
stealing, chucking the pretty girls under the chin ! He 
had loved drink, had Francois; and women. They had 
killed him, between them. The last week of his illness 
had been appalling; the mere recollection of it left an 
evil taste in one’s mouth. 


The Stranger at the Village Well 5 

With his clenched fist the Stranger struck the stone 
slab on which he sat. Women! How much ill they 
did in the world! And how much good! There was 
no middle way. Who should know that better than 
himself? Either they bore you rosy laughing children 
and wrapped you round with the comforts of close over- 
heated homes. Or else they poisoned you, and you died. 
Like Francois. 

The sun dropped down behind the roof of the tall 
‘ ‘ Rathhaus. ’ ’ The well lay in the shadow now; the 
old couple moved silently away to a warmer spot; and 
in the deserted square, watched only by the stone saint, 
the Stranger fell asleep. 

Meanwhile, in a twisting lane that ran close under the 
sheer foundation walls of the old castle, the shoemaker 
Master Fridolin was talking with his only son in the 
low open workshop of his little house. Long years on 
the cobbling-bench had bowed his broad shoulders, but 
he was still the strongest man and the best sharpshooter 
in the parish. Gray steady eyes gleamed above his heavy 
brown beard, and as he reasoned with Kurt he empha- 
sized his words with sharp taps of his hammer. He had 
work to finish, and was too poor to interrupt it, even 
now. 

“An evil business for son of mine,” he said. “Why 
didst thou not confess it before? Yet ’tis scarcely pos- 
sible that this vagrant 'of whom thou hast spoken can 
have any knowledge of thy wrong-doing. Thine own 
uneasy conscience torments thee. Son, — son, — how 
earnest thou to this thing?” 

“I am so ashamed,” stammered the boy. “The cab- 
inetmaker had no suspicions when I exhibited my work. 
But last night he must have looked through my work- 
bench, for now he either knows or he suspects. I didn’t 
think it was so wrong, father. The design for my cup- 
board, — I — I found it under Tony Erler’s bench when 
he ran away before his apprentice-time was up. I 
couldn’t draw a good design myself, and I thought— I 
thought that it would make no difference. The handi- 
craft was all my own. ’ ’ 


6 


The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


“Ah, Kurt, it’s worse to steal headwork than hand- 
work, because there is then no voice save that of thine 
own conscience to call thee to account. And, my son, 
we who labor with our hands, we have our honor. 
Or we used to have, in my time at least. Thou must 
learn to esteem it more highly ; and therefore, my judg- 
ment is that thou give up thy place in the shop to the 
winner of the second prize. But thy dishonesty need 
never be known. As an old friend of my house, thy 
master will keep silence. Nor will other people have 
much chance for gossip, if thou go forth now on thy 
wander-year. Thou must leave without delay. Come 
back a man, and the town will forget thy fault. I never 
shall, though I have forgiven thee already. ’ ’ 

“But, father, let me wait a day or two. Until that 
vagabond, who spoke to me by the well, is gone. He 
might join himself to me on the road, and thou wouldst 
not wish me to have his company. He is either mad 
or insolent. His great mop of black hair frights me, 
and his strange far-seeing eyes. Why, he knew thy 
name, and spoke of a Six-Pointed-Cross-in- the ” 

“What?” 

The shoemaker’s hammer came down with a sudden 
thwack of surprise. 

“I think that was what he said. Something else, too, 
about the forts in Paris. But he was so uncanny, that I 
came away without listening further. ’ ’ 

“The Six-Pointed-Cross-in-the-Dust ? ” exclaimed the 
master, and the shoe between his knees fell to the ground. 

“That was it. And he told me to return to the well 
this afternoon. He wanted to be my companion on my 
wander-year. Of course, I laughed in his face.” 

The master tossed aside his hammer and reached 
up for the green Tyrolese hat that hung above his 
bench. 

“Pack thy belongings together, and bid farewell to 
sister and mother. I give thee twenty minutes to be 
at the well, ready for the road. Obey me, or thou art 
no more son of mine. And oh, but the eyes of youth are 
blind, — blind — blind ! ’ ’ 


The Stranger at the Village Well 7 

He unfastened his leather apron and strode out of the 
house, muttering to himself. Kurt fled up the steep 
twisting stairs to his mother. 

At the well the Stranger was still asleep when a great 
hand, stained brown with tarry thread, was laid softly 
on his knee, and, opening his eyes, he looked up into the 
shoemaker’s broad solemn face. 

“So, Fridolin,” he said, “thou hast not forgotten me 
after all.” 

The master did not return the other’s smile, but sat 
down heavily on the stone ledge at his side. 

“It is in my mind,” he began, “that once I made a 
vow. Whoever should come to me with a certain sign 
should have all that I had to give, even unto one of my 
two children. A life for a life; so I swore.. And when 
my boy spoke of the Six-Pointed Cross, there rose before 
me that long deep ditch near the outer fortifications of 
Paris, and I saw the Frenchman, whom I had slain in my 
anger, lying at my feet. ’ ’ 

“It was a just wrath,” suggested the Stranger. 

“Would that have saved my life in those lawless 
times? But — but — can it be really thou? Let me look 
again. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ A little older, that is all. And a great deal wearier. ’ ’ 

“Yet neither age nor weariness has made thee for- 
get my name. Thou didst even speak kindly with my 
son. Thou hadst not done him so great honor, hadst 
thou known ” 

‘ ‘ But I did know. It was chance, I confess ; for I had 
never remembered that this was thy native town if the 
cabinetmaker had not told me about Kurt and his — his 
mistake. So I spoke to the boy. Trust him to me, 
Fridolin. Let me try to make of him a man like thy- 
self. Such flesh and blood as thine must be well worth 
saving. . . . Only I start at once. ’ ’ 

Master Fridolin sighed with disappointment. 

“I knew that thou wouldst not tarry. I told the boy 
so. Nevertheless I had hoped for a few hours at least 
to talk over old times. ’ ’ 

“Be patient yet a while,” the stranger answered. 


8 


The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


“When I bring Kurt back in strength and honor, 
then thou shalt have thy will of me, dear friend. But 
now the Road calls me, and my feet are dancing to be 
off.” 

“As thou wilt. . . . Here comes my unworthy son.” . 

Fresh from his farewells to home and kindred, his 
eyes still wet with tears, Kurt walked reluctantly across 
the square. He had exchanged his black clothes for a 
rough working-suit of dark blue linen; a bulging knap- 
sack sagged on his shoulders, and he carried a large 
paper-parcel under each arm. 

“Loaded down like a pack-mule,” growled Master 
Fridolin. He pushed Kurt forward in front of the 
Stranger. “This is my boy. If he bothers thee, send 
him home. . . . God keep ye both.” 

He wrung the Stranger’s hand, and, with a rapid side- 
glance at his son, walked away alone. Kurt watched 
the bowed figure until it had half crossed the square. 
Then, with a smothered sob, he threw down his bundles, 
and, calling his father by name, dashed after him and 
flung himself into the master’s out-stretched arms. For 
a moment Fridolin held the boy close to his breast. But 
soon he loosened the clinging hands and kissed his son 
on the forehead. 

“And thy blessing, father. Without that I do not 
go.” 

Kurt fell on his knees; and the master, like some 
ancient prophet in Israel, lifting his eyes heavenward 
muttered a prayer and laid both his hands on the boy’s 
bent head. Then he turned and hurried away without 
looking back, for his heart was torn within him. 

Kurt stumbled up to the well again, hesitating and 
embarrassed. 

“Thou mayst thank God for that blessing,” the 
Stranger said. “Hadst thou permitted thy father to 
return to his house in sorrow, I should have taken 
the road alone. Let us be off. ’ ’ 

They passed quickly through the narrow streets, 
dodging in and out among the crowds of chattering 
children on their way home from school. When they 


The Stranger at the Village Well 9 

had left the last house behind them and saw the rolling 
Bavarian country spreading out to the horizon, the 
Stranger drew a deep breath of relief. 

“And now, comrade,’ ’ he said, as they struck into the 
highroad, “we are free men once more. Chase away 
the \ curiosity that is doubtless almost bursting thy 
brajn; I have no present intention of satisfying it; so 
occupy thy mind rather with thanksgivings, because 
thou hadst had better luck than most men in being able 
to leave thy sins behind thee. We shall forget that 
small matter of the cupboard. As for thy father, it is 
enough for thee to know that the service which I once 
rendered him has been more than repaid by his loyal 
remembrance of it. I set a high value upon gratitude. 
It is so exceedingly rare. And that often makes my 
life-work but a discouraging business. ’ ’ % 

‘ ‘ Thy life-work ? ’ ’ queried the boy shyly. Already he 
had begun to feel the peculiar charm of the Stranger’s 
personality, and caught himself wondering why he had 
at first seen nothing more than an ill-dressed vagabond 
in this mysterious deliverer. 

“My life-work, young esquire, is like that of all noble 
knights. I go through the world seeking to do good. 
Not striving, as the fashion was in times past, to right 
men’s wrong; for that is quite impossible. But trying 
to make the wrongs, once done, easier to bear. Not 
succoring the innocent. But lending a hand to the 
guilty.” 

“Like me?” 

“Yes, and to men far guiltier than thou wilt ever be, 
please God. In an age like ours, the innocent appear to 
need no help; they are protected by law and public 
opinion. But of the really guiltless, there are very few, 
and those most uninteresting. That has been always 
so. Even when knights abounded on the highways, 
I am inclined to think that many a fair lady, who 
clamored to be delivered from the dungeon of some 
cruel giant, was not without blame for her unhappy 
plight: she had probably met the giant more than half 
way and persuaded him to ravish her from a stupid 


10 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


maiden home, considering too much of a man better than 
too little.’ ’ 

“The world was very interesting then,” sighed Kurt. 
‘ ‘ But now nothing happens anywhere any more. ’ ’ 

“Oh, we shan’t lack exciting adventures, we two. 
There will be dragons to overcome, and giants, and 
wicked magicians. Only they won’t always appear 
in such forms as one might reasonably expect them to 
assume. ’ ’ 

“Thou sayest that I must ask no questions,” stam- 
mered Kurt, his eyes wide open with eager attention. 
‘ ‘ But one I must ask. How shall I call thee ¥ ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ I have many names, each one the gift of some friend. 
It is the giver alone that lends worth to a name. When 
thy father knew me long ago, he called me ‘Cigarette’; 
and his son may speak to me so still, until he can find me 
a name of his own devising.” 

Towards evening the two wanderers stopped for the 
night at the roadside. Far ahead of them stretched the 
unbroken dusty way, bordered on each side by an 
interminable row of straight stiff poplars, that melted 
gradually into the distance in two black converging 
lines against the dull red of the western sky. Kurt 
dropped his knapsack in the dry ditch, and stretched his 
weary arms. With one hand Cigarette lifted the dis- 
carded burden. 

“Twice too heavy,” he said. “We must hold a day 
of Judgment on thy belongings, and separate the sheep 
from the goats.” 

After Kurt had opened his parcels and had spread out 
the contents of his knapsack on the grass, his companion 
picked and chose until he had divided the whole into 
two equal piles. 

“Bundle these things together,” Cigarette said, point- 
ing to a heap that was topped by a bright purple cravat 
and a pair of reversible celluloid cuffs with red Tirolese 
eagles for buttons. “We’ll leave them at the first con- 
venient cottage and let the farmer store them safely 
away, so that when we come back this way again we 


The Stranger at the Village Well 11 

may have new and gorgeous raiment awaiting us. . . . 
What’s all this trash?” 

At the bottom of the knapsack lay a roll of cheap 
pamphlets, vilely printed and with glaring illustrations. 
Cigarette unfolded them one by one. 

“The World’s Greatest Detective Series,” he read 
aloud. “A Germanized mish-mash of S. Holmes, Esq.; 
and not even the real Sherlock at that. This production 
would greatly grieve the good Dr. Doyle. . . . Mr. 
Baffles too. Also in Teutonic dress. . . . And so this is 
Kurt’s favorite brand of brain-food.” 

“All fellows of my age read these stories,” protested 
Kurt, feeling ashamed without knowing why. 

Cigarette tore the pamphlets across and tossed them 
in the ditch at his feet. 

“We won’t need them,” he said. “We’re going to 
have plenty of excitement without their help. Oh, I’m 
not blaming thee; not for a moment. Every boy has a 
natural craving for adventure; and if he can’t satisfy 
it in the right way, he turns to ill-written records of 
impossible crimes. When a lad’s blood begins to drum 
in his ears, when the roof of his home seems to press 
down on the top of his head, then his parents ought to 
send him out on the Road, especially if he be town-bred. 
There is more excitement lying around loose in the world 
than in all the books ever written. . . . But here’s a 
package that we haven’t opened yet. . . . Oh, what 
luxury. Sausage ! Cold liver ! Fresh cheese ! I bless 
thy good mother. Gather some dry sticks and I’ll soon 
have the kettle boiling. There isn ’t a mounted gendarme 
within miles to see the fire; we’re not in reactionary 
Prussia, thank God. . . . Coffee? Not a drop. Thou 
must learn to drink tea, and to praise the saints when it 
isn’t stone cold.” 

After finishing their supper, they sat down side by 
side near the edge of the road; and while they smoked 
and watched the moon rise over the hay-fields, Cigarette 
told fairy-tales, such as Kurt had never heard. Stories 
of adventure too. And the boy listened breathlessly, 


12 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


surrendering himself more and more to the strange 
fascination of his companion’s voice. 

“Time for bed,” said the story-teller at last, tossing 
away the glowing end of his cigarette. “But first, 
come here to me.” 

The boy moved closer; and Cigarette, bending down, 
smoothed out the dust of the highway and drew upon it 
a circle, in which he inscribed a six-pointed cross. Then, 
sweeping into his hand the dry earth on which he had 
written, he held his arm above Kurt’s head and let the 
dust trickle through his fingers over the lad’s curly 
brown hair. 

‘ ‘ The Baptism of the Road, ’ ’ he said. ‘ 1 And like most 
baptisms, once you ’ve had it, you carry its marks through 
life, cut deep down into your soul.” 

They stretched themselves out at the roots of the 
tallest three. Kurt curled himself up under his blanket ; 
but Cigarette lay on his back, his hands beneath his 
head, gazing up at the clouds that sailed slowly across 
the moonlit sky. 

“That odd white light on the far horizon,” he said, 
half to himself, “reminds me of the minarets in Con- 
stantinople. They were exactly that color one evening 
when I happened to be down near the water and saw a 
body float by, the body of a man who had spoken to me 
but i hour before, a man who had known too much. 
But I knew even more than he. So I was afraid. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ Tell me about it, ’ ’ demanded Kurt, moving nearer to 
Cigarette’s side. 

And Cigarette told. 

When he had finished his story, he lay silent with 
closed eyes. After a few moments of quiet, he heard 
a voice at his ear. 

“Art thou still awake? I thought that the sky might 
perhaps remind thee of something else. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ It does. Those trailing clouds make me think of the 
fog-wrapped peaks above the Brenner Pass. Once, near 
the Italian frontier, I saw a fight to the death between 
a forester and an outlaw. And the clouds above their 
heads were ” 


The Stranger at the Village Well 13 

“Tell me about it,” interrupted Kurt. He drew the 
blanket up to his chin, and lay close to Cigarette, look- 
ing up into his face. 

So Cigarette told. 

Then he bade the boy good-night, and was drifting off 
into unconsciousness again, when some one plucked him 
by the sleeve and he sat up with a start. 

“Excuse me,” murmured Kurt’s voice. “But the 
clouds are gone now. Doesn’t the moon remind thee of 
a story?” 

“Of fifty,” answered Cigarette with unconcealed im- 
patience. 

“Then tell me one of them at least. I can’t get to 
sleep. It’s all so new and strange, lying out here like 
this.” 

And Cigarette told of a moonlit night on the Bay 
of Naples, when he had rowed back from Capri with 
two “Honorable Youths” of the Camorra, who had 
been “performing a prowess,” and who had shown him 
the bloody knives that they were taking home in evi- 
dence of their courage. 

Kurt shivered deliciously; he was always interested 
in murders. But he began to feel a little nervous too, 
and crept still closer to Cigarette, until his head almost 
touched his companion’s arm. 

The story ended, silence settled down once g. uore. 
Cigarette’s deep regular breathing grew softer; and, 
as the moon rose high above the trees, a narrow beam 
of light passed across his smooth handsome face, his 
closed eyes with their long lashes, and the tangled 
masses of his thick black hair. 

But Kurt was still thinking of the Camorra, and of 
bloody knives. 

“Cigarette . . . Oh, please, Cigarette” 

“Well?” answered an angry voice, heavy with sleep. 

“I only wanted to ask whether the stars didn’t re- 
mind ” 

A hand shot out and clutched furiously at Kurt ’s hair. 
But the boy moved deftly aside, and, dodging under the 
waving arm, laid his head on Cigarette ’s shoulder. 


14 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


“Art thou sure that the stars don’t re ” 

Cigarette turned his head; and, with his lips close 
to the boy ’s ear, whispered severely : 

“If you dare to ask me any more impertinent ques- 
tions, I shall call your father.” 


ADVENTURE FIRST 
THE THREE THIEVES 


Cigarette and his new companion had been on the road 
for nearly two weeks. Kurt tried to be patient, as he 
had been warned that these first days were nothing but 
a practice-match, and that the dragons and giants, of 
which Cigarette had spoken, might not safely be en- 
countered until the young esquire’s muscles were hard- 
ened, and he was fully master of his own body. So, with- 
out adventure, they had come across the lowlands to 
Munich. 

But Cigarette hated the hot asphalt of the city streets, 
and they pushed on at once to Kufstein, on the Austrian 
frontier. Here they spent a night. Next morning, as 
they left the little border town, with its gray castle-rock 
rising sheer from the winding streets, Cigarette pointed 
to the broad road ahead of them. 

‘ ‘ From now on, ’ 9 he said, ‘ ‘ we travel in good company, 
following the footsteps of Roman soldiers, ancient tribes- 
men, and medieval emperors; for along this valley of 
the Inn ran the great imperial road, connecting these 
provinces with the capital.” 

And Kurt listened, open-mouthed, to the flow of anec r 
dote and historical detail that this curious man brought 
forth from the treasure-house of his inexhaustible mem- 
ory. He told of the legionary camps and the minute 
exactness of Roman warfare; of the Empire’s breaking 
bulwarks and the thundering rush of the invading bar- 
barians; and of Emperor Maximilian, the last of the 
great knights, who came floating down the Inn on his last 
earthly voyage, with his coffin standing ready at the stern 
of his state barge. Cigarette knew all these people, and 
he spoke of them as a man speaks of trusted friends. The 
way seemed very short to Kurt. 

15 


16 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


By the time that they reached Innsbruck, early on the 
third morning after leaving Kufstein, Kurt had begun 
to take a great interest in the Emperor “Max,” and 
insisted on going directly to the imperial tomb in the 
“ Hof-Kirche, ” where he stood gazing devoutly through 
the wrought-iron grating, until Cigarette dashed all his 
ardor by telling him that Maximilian was not buried 
there at all. Kurt was disappointed and sulked. 

“But it's the most wonderful tomb in the world,” in- 
sisted Cigarette as they left the church. “And it would 
be neither more nor less for all the dry bones of the house 
of Hapsburg.” 

But Kurt had been robbed of an illusion and would not 
be comforted. 

“Wilt thou forgive me if I show thee something of 
unusual interest ? ’ ’ 

Cigarette was leading the way up the long street past 
the University, and at his question Kurt’s face bright- 
ened, although he still did his best to scowl. 

“One of thy promised dragons or captured damsels, I 
suppose,” he answered incredulously. 

“Something of the kind. Look over there, — at the 
small window of the Jesuit College.” 

“I don’t see anything, except a boy with a round, 
stupid face. And he’s been snivelling, too. What’s in- 
teresting about him?” 

“He may be a captured damsel in disguise. I know 
that window. It belongs to a disused store-room off the 
porter’s lodge, and it isn’t the place where one ever sees 
wet eyes or dry ones either. Follow me. We’re going to 
visit the good Fathers. Let’s hope that they don’t turn 
out to be cruel giants. ’ ’ 

With Kurt close at his heels Cigarette pushed open the 
outer door of the drab-colored building, and stepped 
into a narrow stone-paved hall. At its further end was 
another door, and the wall on the right was pierced by a 
window, behind which Kurt could see the top of a black 
skull-cap. Cigarette tapped on the glass, and the sliding 
pane was at once opened by a smiling, red-cheeked lay- 


The Three Thieves 17 

brother in a faded black cassock, who asked the visitors’ 
pleasure. 

“We’ve come to beg,” said Cigarette simply. “Might 
we have a bowl of soup at noon from the College- 
kitchen ? ’ ’ 

The porter’s smile disappeared. The House had its 
regular poor to feed, and more than enough of them. 

Cigarette became politely discursive. 

“We are Belgians. My younger brother and I have 
vowed to visit Rome before we die and to kneel before 
Christ’s Vicar, even though we be compelled to walk 
every step of the way. ’ ’ 

The lay-brother looked less severe. He mentioned 
that Belgium was a pleasant country; or so he had 
always heard. The people, too, were said to be good 
Catholics. 

“That we are,” cried Cigarette. “But, alas! we are 
passing through evil days under a Liberal Government. 
My own poor father lost his place as clerk in the postal 
service, because he simply would not vote for a heretic.” 

“It is a great privilege to suffer for the faith,” the 
brother answered. Then he asked Cigarette whether he 
had yet visited the various churches of Innsbruck. 

“We were expecting to do nothing else to-day. But, 
coming from mass just now, my brother here wrenched 
his ankle so badly that he must rest somewhere until he 
can walk with less pain. ’ ’ 

The porter confessed that he felt interested in Bel- 
gium, and suggested that, as the “Little One” was so 
lame, the two pilgrims might as well sit down for a while 
in his lodge. 

“Limp, little one, limp,” whispered Cigarette. And 
Kurt did his best. 

The red-cheeked Jesuit closed the window and pulled a 
rope in the lodge that released the catch of the inner 
door in the narrow hall. As Kurt crossed the threshold 
of the College he caught a glimpse of long, quiet, white- 
washed corridors, and was conscious of a strange close 
smell that offended his nostrils. Yet there was some- 


18 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


thing mysteriously attractive about the house. A green 
bit of an old garden, seen through a stone archway, and 
two silent, smiling black figures that greeted him politely 
as they passed, gave the boy a sudden sense of peace; 
and he felt that it must be good to live here — if one 
could. 

The lodge opened on the main passage-way at the 
right of the inner door, and was a dusky, oblong room 
with a few wretched sticks of furniture between its bare 
white walls. The lay-brother made his guests welcome 
and offered Kurt the only chair. Cigarette, however, 
seemed unable to find a place to lay his knapsack. 

“ I ’ll toss it inside here out of your way, ’ ’ he said, and 
opened a low door in the farther corner. As if in sur- 
prise, he started back and turned to the porter. “I beg 
your pardon ; I thought the room was empty. But there 
is a young gentleman ” 

“Young gentleman?” interrupted the brother scorn- 
fully. “Young thief, you’d better say. We’ve just 
caught him, and I’ve had orders to keep him shut up 
in this old store-room, until he ’s ready to make a full con- 
fession. ’ ’ 

“Then he hasn’t made one yet?” 

“He says that he can’t; swears that he’s innocent. 
But we have proofs of his wickedness. And he lives 
from our charity too. We give free meals, you know, 
to poor scholars. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ How did it all happen ? ’ ’ 

“For the last six months some one has been stealing 
small sums from the rooms of our theological students. 
This college has always prepared young men for the 
priesthood, chiefly members of the high nobility. We 
have two princes here now, and no end of grafs and 
barons. A few days ago one of these gentlemen felt 
unwell during dinner and left the Refectory. When he 
reached his study he found that his desk had been 
opened and a thousand-kronen 1 note taken from his 
pocket-book. Fortunately he remembered that in the 

1 “Krone,” about twenty-four cents. The “heller” is the hun- 
dredth part of a “krone.” 


The Three Thieves 19 

corridor, very near his room, he had passed this Joseph 
Slitz, who was acting most suspiciously. ’ ’ 

And on his evidence you locked the boy up ? ’ ’ 

‘‘No. We lost some valuable time, because Graf 
Ziewitsch, from whom the note was stolen, did not men- 
tion his meeting with Joseph until the next morning. 
But to-day, when the boy came for his breakfast, our 
Regent confronted him with the Graf, who recognized 
him at once as the person he had seen in the corridor. 
Yet the ungrateful child refused to confess. He said 
that when the Graf passed him he was hastening to the 
poor scholar’s table, as he happened to be late for din- 
ner. In reality he had just come from rifling the Graf’s 
desk; and, if that unsuspecting gentleman had seized 
him on the spot, we should have found the missing note 
in his pocket. But now he has had time to hide the 
money, and it can’t be traced. We sent another of our 
charity students, a friend of Joseph’s, to search the 
thief’s room. He discovered nothing, however, except 
forty kronen in small silver. Our Regent is going to the 
bank this afternoon to see whether the boy changed his 
note there. Then we shall know something definite.” 

“Are you so thoroughly convinced of Joseph’s guilt?” 

The red-cheeked porter hesitated and lowered his voice. 

“I’d give a good deal to believe him innocent. He 
was always a decently behaved lad, and I did feel sorry 
for him morning, when our Regent lost his temper, 
shook Viis^u^ui^r Joseph’s nose, and yelled ‘thief — 
thief’ till my own earsrajig.” 

“Blood tells, even in & Jesuit,” muttered Cigarette. 
“ If I remember rightly, the father of your good Regent 
was an uneducated peasant.” 

The porter looked up suspiciously. This stranger 
from Belgium seemed rather too well informed. . . . 
But at the same moment the bell in the lodge tinkled, 
a sign that some one was waiting at the door to leave the 
house. 

The porter pulled at his rope ; the inner door opened ; 
and Cigarette, peering into the hall through the lodge 
window, saw a thin black shape pass lightly across the 


20 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


stone pavement. It stopped, came towards the lodge, 
and a small face with delicate aristocratic features was 
pressed against the pane. 

“You have the thief still safe, brother, I hope,” said 
a very smooth voice. 

The porter nodded, and the black cassock vanished at 
the front door. 

“That was Graf Ziewitsch,” the brother explained. 
“He is in very poor health, and the Regent permits him 
to take a morning walk twice every week. ’ ’ 

Cigarette seemed to take no interest in the Graf. He 
had suddenly remembered that a letter was waiting for 
him at the post-office. He promised to be back in half an 
hour; and, in the meanwhile, if the porter would allow 
it, his lame brother might remain quietly in the lodge. 
He started towards the door, but Kurt followed him with 
an ostentatious limp. 

“Get a chance to talk with the imprisoned damsel,” 
whispered Cigarette. “No; I must go alone. Hobble 
back to the good brother and tell him all about beauti- 
ful Belgium.” 

Cigarette set off down the street on a run; and be- 
fore he had passed the University he saw in front of him 
the long black-cloaked figure that he was seeking. So 
he made less haste. As yet he did not know exactly , what 
he intended to do; but the sound of this young van’s 
voice had raised his distrust, and experience had fi.ught 
him that his antipathies were seldom ‘Wi.'ift; Then, 
too, he had been touched by that. Mr-stained face at the 
window of the old store-room - Jilven though the lad had 
stolen all the money in the-' desuit College, he should go 
free somehow. Who beat a starving dog for snatching 
at a bone? And like a dog the poor child had been 
treated by these dispensers of Christian charity, who 
bought another’s frith d with food and sent him to 
search his comrade’s ro<.m for proofs of guilt. 

Graf Ziewitsch walked slowly along the Burg-Graben, 
turned up the Museums-strasse, and pushed open the 
door of a low dilapidated l lilding. On the windows of 
the first floor were two rows of yellow faded letters — 


The Three Thieves 


21 


“Moses Kamel. ” 

Bank. 

Without a moment’s hesitation Cigarette walked after 
the young theologian. He found himself in a close ill- 
lighted room, with a long counter running down the 
middle. On the further side of this barrier several pale 
clerks were trying to keep their tempers in at least five 
different languages; while before them a long line of 
tourists had already lost theirs, each in his own tongue, 
and were speechless with rage. Some of these travelers 
were no better dressed than Cigarette, who had counted 
on the German tourists’ anxiety to avoid being asked 
high prices by making themselves look like laborers out 
of work, or impecunious vagrants. He waited until 
Ziewitsch had finished his business and had left the bank : 
then he went up to the patient fair-haired clerk with 
whom the Graf had been speaking. 

He explained that he had come merely to ask advice. 
His money left in the safe of his hotel, was all in Eng- 
lish bank-notes of high denominations ; and, before 
changing it into Austrian currency, he wished to know 
whether he could get paper of equivalent values, be- 
cause he disliked carrying thick wads of small notes. 
They made one’s wallet so bulgy, and were uncomfort- 
able in the breast-pocket. For example, were there 
such things as Austrian notes for one thousand kro- 
nen? 

“Oh, yes,” said the clerk. “But you must give us a 
little time to get them together for you. This isn’t 
Vienna, you know.’.’ 

“And you’re sure that they’re not large thick things, 
like the German paper?” 

“I can show you such a note at once, sir,” the clerk 
answered, reaching down into a deep drawer. 

The square of colored paper quite absorbed Cigarette’s 
attention. He read and re-read the long number in the 
upper corner, praying that his unmathematical brain 
might retain that line of figures without mistake. As he 
handed back the note, he said — 


22 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


1 ‘It’s curious that you should have had one of these in 
your cash-drawer, just when I wanted it.” 

“Mere chance. The note was paid over this counter 
only a moment ago. ’ ’ 

“Are you never deceived into accepting a counter- 
feit ? ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ Oh, I look carefully at a large note, unless I happen 
to know, as I do in this case, the person who gave it to 
me. Not many of the clergy keep accounts with us, so 
it won’t be difficult for me to remember where this de- 
posit came from. ’ ’ 

“I hadn’t realized that priests were so well-off.” 

“Well, this one is, though he isn’t a priest yet. The 
old Graf is enormously rich. But I mustn’t gossip any 
longer. ’ ’ 

Cigarette promised to let the clerk know when he de- 
cided to change his English money, and hurried out of 
the bank. 

He was rather at a . loss now. What should he do 
next? Might not this wealthy Ziewitsch have had two 
or more large notes, only one of which had been stolen? 
And yet, it was he who persisted so emphatically in di- 
verting every one’s suspicions to the unfortunate Joseph. 

Cigarette was lounging along, absorbed by his doubts, 
when some one, coming from the opposite direction, ran 
into him. 

“Pardon, tausendmal pardon,” said a soft voice. 

Cigarette pricked up his ears and blessed his lucky 
stars. It was Ziewitsch, returning from his morning 
walk. 

Cigarette faced about and followed the theologian, 
who went into a Franciscan church, where he knelt for 
some moments before a miraculous Saint Anthony of 
some local reputation ; that saint who, among other kind 
offices, restores to pious owners all articles lost, strayed, 
or stolen. Cigarette waited at the door until the young 
man brushed by him on the way out. 

“He’s been crying,” said Cigarette to himself. “His 
conscience isn’t easy, and there must be good in him after 
all. I must try to get at it somehow.” 


The Three Thieves 


23 


He overtook Ziewitsch and tugged gently at the end 
of his flying black cloak. 

* ‘ I wish to speak with the Herr Graf about that bank- 
note/ ' 

The young man stopped and turned on his questioner 
a white frightened face. 

“There is a comfortable seat over there by the foun- 
tain,” suggested Cigarette. “You had best do as I ask. 
I have no wish to lay this matter before the Regent of 
your seminary.” 

As if taking the other’s consent for granted, he walked 
on ahead, sat down on the bench, and waited until 
Ziewitsch came up. 

“Pray make yourself comfortable, Herr Graf,” said 
the strange figure in the worn patched clothes, with a 
gracious wave of his hand. 

“You referred to my lost note,” began Ziewitsch in an 
unsteady voice. “Are you a detective, then?” 

“Yes; of a peculiar kind. My only desire is to be of 
service, not to the law, but to yourself. First of all, 
have you the number of that bank-note ? ’ ’ 

“Of course. I wrote it down somewhere in case of 
accident. ’ ’ 

Ziewitsch drew a small memorandum-book from his 
pocket and turned over the leaves. Suddenly some new 
thought seemed to cross his mind; he closed the book 
quickly. But Cigarette, looking over his shoulder, had 
already noticed a line of six numbers at the bottom of a 
page; and these figures corresponded exactly with those 
that his brain was laboring to retain. 

“I can’t find that memorandum,” said Ziewitsch, 
speaking more boldly. His fright was passing. “I 
must have torn out the very page we need. So, if the 
note should be discovered anywhere, I have no means of 
positively identifying it as my stolen property. ’ ’ 

“Had you more than a single one of the same value?” 

“Not I. My good father, who is rather strict in 
matters of religion, doesn’t believe in giving me any 
more money than other theologians have. The note in 
question was intended to cover a whole term’s expenses. 


24 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


My college fees alone come to some six hundred kronen. 
But I have written my father about the theft, so that he 
can make good my loss. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ And you still desire that the note should be found ? ’ ’ 
“You are making fun of me. Naturally I want my 
thousand kronen. But I have given up all hope of 
recovering them, as the thief will probably hide the note, 
until he can change it in some other city. ’ ’ 

“In one point only, Herr Graf,” said Cigarette, “have 
you been indiscreet. You should never have stopped at 
the Franciscan church to pray before that picture of St. 
Anthony. As you know, this particular saint has a great 
knack of discovering missing property, and in your de- 
votions you probably forgot to inform him of your reasons 
for not wishing that note to be found.” 

‘ ‘ My reasons for not wishing it found ? ’ ’ 

“You have none then? In that case, I can only con- 
gratulate you on having thought to carry your suit to so 
powerful an intercessor. You owe St. Anthony at least 
ten candles. He has discovered your lost money.” 

“But that is quite impossible, and he ” 

“You forget the theological distinction between an 
event merely miraculous, and an event impossible ‘per 
se.’ I held your note in my hand, not ten minutes ago, 
at Herr Kamel’s bank. . . . But you don’t seem very 
grateful to the excellent saint.” 

Ziewitsch made no answer; and Cigarette remember- 
ing the unhappy face that had peered out from the 
store-room window, dropped his bantering tone, and 
became severe. 

“So you would have allowed that poor lad to bear 
disgrace, to give up his studies, to see his whole life 
ruined, to ” 

“Oh no, no, no,” interrupted Ziewitsch, slurring his 
words and running them together in his eagerness to 
speak. “The boy would never have been punished. 
The Jesuit Fathers are so unpopular here, that they 
would have kept the matter out of the courts. Why, 
you might murder a dozen of them, and the average 
jury would bring in a verdict of Justifiable Homicide. 


The Three Thieves 


25 


I knew all that. And then Joseph might have been able 
to prove his innocence. I didn’t mean him to suffer, and 
should have helped him with money when the trouble 
had blown over. . . . But I’m sorry now. I didn’t ex- 
pect — I never realized all that might happen. ’ ’ 

“Of that I am sure. If I were not, we two should not 
he sitting here. Come, tell me the whole story. I’m a 
trustworthy confessor.” 

For a moment the young man’s consciousness of guilt 
was submerged by a last wave of rebellious pride. 

“I don’t see what you want me to say. And I don’t 
believe that you’re a detective at all. There’s something 
about your voice, too, that — that sounds familiar.” 

‘ ‘ I am the voice of your own conscience. That is what 
you mean. And I know you so well that I can tell the 
story without your help. Correct your conscience, if it 
errs. ... You knew that there had been many small 
thefts in the College of late. One noon, while every- 
body else was at dinner you came back by chance to your 
room and found the drawer of your desk open. Per- 
haps you missed a few kronen in silver ; perhaps nothing 
whatever had been touched. At any rate, your large 
bank-note was safe. . . . Then you were tempted. You 
needed money badly for some secret purpose ; so you hid 
the note, reported it as stolen, and at your first oppor- 
tunity got rid of it by depositing it in the bank. Hav- 
ing invented a theft, you supplied the necessary thief by 
telling lies about a boy whom you claimed to have seen in 
the corridor near your room.” 

‘ ‘ There was no lie about that. I did see J oseph hurry- 
ing along the hall. But no one could ever have proven 
that he took the money.” 

“Perhaps not. But remember the boy’s position here. 
He lives from what people miscall their charity; and 
no one would have been willing to help him further after 
such a scandal. To him the merest suspicion of thieving 
means utter ruin.” 

“I understand that now, and it was of Joseph I was 
thinking as I knelt in the church. But I’ve gone too 
far to retreat, and I need that money. You can’t im- 


26 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


agine Iioav much! Oh, not for myself. To-morrow I 
must pay it all into the hands of another. 

‘‘I begin to see more clearly. This — debt was con- 
tracted before you were measured for a black cassock. 
Could you not appeal to your father ? ’ ’ 

“That would be the end of everything. Let me try 
to tell you a little about myself. By nature I am a very 
religious man. Not a good one, I confess. But all the 
same, I have a true vocation. Even while still a child, I 
always intended to become a priest; I could imagine no 
other life as possible for me. But — but 99 

4 4 The flesh lusted against the spirit, and its lusting got 
you into trouble ? ’ ’ 

4 4 Trouble ? To my class-mates my trouble would have 
been nothing but a romantic adventure. And yet, if my 
father heard of it now, he would imagine that I had been 
playing the hypocrite all along, and was only taking 
orders because of the ecclesiastical career that our family 
connections assure me. He is such a strait-laced Catho- 
lic; he would insist that I was not called of God to the 
priesthood, and would not give me another heller for my 
college-fees. I should have to study Law, or administer 
one of his distant estates. And I should die, I think. 
Yes — die. For I only live in the hopes of my future 
priesthood .’ 9 

4 4 Permit me to ask one question, Herr Graf.” 

The older man’s voice was so full of sympathy that 
Ziewitsch was surprised and touched. He nodded. And 
Cigarette went on — 

44 1 do not ask from idle curiosity, but because I trust 
to lay your ghosts for ever. Will you give me the name 
and address of this — this person ? ’ ’ 

4 4 You mean of the girl ? ’ ’ 

4 4 If you choose to call her so. Allow me to settle all 
her claims upon you, and I think I can promise that you 
need never again be tormented by anything except your 
own memory. ’ ’ 

Ziewitsch scribbled a few words on a bit of paper. 

4 4 It will be a simple matter,” said Cigarette. 4 4 The 
town where she lives lies on my way southward. But 


The Three Thieves 


27 


now you will kindly hurry to the bank and draw out that 
thousand kronen. Get the same note. It will be there 
yet. The clerks will think you an idiot without a doubt. 
But that is part of the penance that I impose as your 
confessor. Then you must go to your Regent and tell 
him that you have discovered the lost note, tucked away 
in an overlooked corner of your pocket-book. He will 
probably share the clerk’s opinion of your intellectual 
abilities. That is another part of your penance. I shall 
wait here until you come back from the bank.” 

“I’m off And — and I’m more than grateful to 

you for being such a patient confessor. You ought to 
have been a priest. You’ve turned my mind inside out 
like an old glove.” 

When the Graf had gone, Cigarette stretched out his 
legs in the sun and smiled lazily. 

“Ought to have been a priest.” What a wonderfully 
self-satisfied lot the clergy were; and how well he knew 
that tone of caste-pride in the voices of God’s Elect. It 
brought back a thousand recollections, not all agree- 
able ones either. Nevertheless he was glad that he had 
not forgotten how to extract information from a penitent 
at the crucial moment of his moral breakdown. He had 
learned this skill in a hard school, and, like so many other 
things, he had learned it long ago : it lay far back in his 
life, even beyond his memories of a woman’s soothing 
voice and of children’s clinging hands. Yet something 
else besides the young theologian’s words had reminded 
him of those long months in the stuffy bare rooms with 
their creaking floors and unwashed window-panes. What 
had it been ? Ah, yes ! The close damp smell of the hall 
in the Jesuit College. That smell was the same the world 
over. 

“Here you have it,” said the Graf’s voice. 

Cigarette looked up from the bank-note in his hand, 
and saw that the young man ’s face was alight with happi- 
ness. He was finding, it seemed, some joy in his pen- 
ance. Cigarette walked with him as far as the front door 
of the College. 

“We part here,” he said. “Go straight to your room. 


28 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


Rediscover the note. Inform the authorities. And then, 
come directly with the news to the porter’s lodge. You 
may find me there, but you needn’t recognize me. And 
now good-by. Forget that woman. You may safely do 
so, I pledge you my word. Only — only do try to be a 
good priest. An evil one has such a power for harm. 
And when you stand at the altar, remember me some- 
times there. ’ ’ 

4 4 On every anniversary of this day, so long as I live, I 
shall say a mass for you.” 

The porter opened the inner door, and Ziewitsch went 
quickly towards the stairs, while Cigarette returned in 
great good spirits to the lodge, where he was welcomed 
somewhat nervously by the lay-brother, whom he found 
quite alone in the narrow cell. 

4 4 The Little One is with Joseph,” said the porter. 
4 4 The Regent passed by my window once or twice, and 
I was so afraid that he might peek in; for I’m not al- 
lowed to have visitors in the lodge, you know. Besides, 
the store-room was your brother’s own suggestion.” 

“Now that’s too bad,” exclaimed Cigarette. 4 4 We’ve 
caused you a lot of unnecessary worry. I was hoping 
to have a few moments ’ rest here myself, but I refuse ab- 
solutely to get you into trouble. Why not let me sit down 
in the store-room too ? ’ ’ 

4 4 That would be safer for all of us. Our old Rector 
wouldn’t say anything, but if the Regent caught a 
glimpse of you, he’d bundle you into the street with his 
own hands. You stay hidden till the Fathers go to din- 
ner. Then I ’ll get you some soup from the kitchen, and 
you can sit out here with me and talk about Belgium. 
The Little One told me so many interesting stories that 
I’m anxious for more. You see, I have an only sister in 
a convent near Antwerp.” v 

The store-room was so dimly lighted that at first Ciga- 
rette could scarcely see. Little by little, he made out 
two dark shapes, sitting on the floor in a far corner. The 
suspected thief had hidden his face in his hands, while 
Kurt sat at his side, clumsily patting his heaving shoul- 
ders. 


The Three Thieves 29 

1 ‘ I thought thou wouldst never come back, ’ ’ whispered 
Kurt. 

“But I’ve done a lot of good work. Tell the child to 
stop crying. Everything is all right, and in a few mo- 
ments he’ll be released. The whole College shall apolo- 
gize, for now they know that he isn ’t a thief at all. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ Oh, but he is. He has just confessed it all to me. ’ ’ 

“What?” demanded Cigarette with a gasp. 

He twisted his fingers in the unhappy Joseph’s hair 
and tugged until the boy stood up. He was a heavily- 
built peasant lad with a snub nose and honest eyes, red 
and swollen with excess of woe. 

“Don’t be too hard on him,” Kurt pleaded. “I’d 
have done the same thing in his place. It happened this 
way. Joseph wants to be a physician, and he’s working 
his way through school here, till he’s ready for the Uni- 
versity. He hasn’t any money of his own, but some 
people give him a few kronen, and others let him eat 
what’s left over when they’ve finished. And he doesn’t 
have to pay any tuition fees, as long as he gets the high- 
est mark in 1 Conduct. ’ But last semester, some boys in 
his class set off a rocket in the schoolroom ; and, although 
J oseph didn ’t have anything to do with the fireworks, his 
teacher wouldn’t believe it and gave him only the sec- 
ond conduct mark. So this semester he has either got to 
pay his fees, or give up his studies and go back to the 
farm. The school-money amounts to forty kronen, and 
to get it together he almost killed himself. He shoveled 
snow; he begged; he starved. On lots of cold days he 
had nothing to eat but bread and coffee. By-and-by he 
had saved thirty kronen. But pay-day came nearer and 
nearer, and to save his life he couldn’t see any way of 
earning the ten kronen that were lacking. Then at the 
poor scholars’ table, he heard of the thefts from the 
theologians’ rooms, and of how some one was supposed 
to have hidden himself in a hall-closet until the students 
went to dinner and he had a good chance to ransack their 
unlocked desks. It seemed such an easy way to get the 
money. Joseph came to the College twice a week for a 
meal; and one day, instead of going straight to the 


30 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


Refectory, he hid somewhere in the corridor, and later on 
slipped into several of the empty studies. He had luck, 
for it was the first of the month ; and he collected ten 
kronen in as many minutes. Not a heller more than he 
needed did he touch. He was just coming out of a room, 
opposite Graf Ziewitsch’s closed door, when he saw some 
one tiptoeing softly down the hall. It was the porter. 

“Not our friend with the red cheeks,” protested Ciga- 
rette. 

“Yes it was,” said Joseph; his voice hoarse from long 
hours of sobbing. “I suppose he was keeping watch for 
the thief. Anyway, he went into the Graf’s room and 
shut the door. That same instant, footsteps sounded in 
the hall. The porter ran out of the Graf’s study, and 
hurried down the corridor, away from the person that 
was coming. I tried to escape too. But my way to the 
Refectory lay in the other direction, and it seemed safer 
to walk past one of the students than to risk meeting the 
porter, who knew me well by sight. So that ’s how I came 
to be seen by Graf Ziewitsch. And though I never 
touched his old bank-note nor even went into his room, 
I did take that other money and I can’t go on denying it. 
They ’ll send me away from school ; and I ’ll never get to 
be a doctor now. And I do so want to help cure the 
poor people, who live far out in the country where there 
isn ’t even an apothecary, and where so many of us die be- 
fore any help can come, — like my own mother.” 

The thought of all these ruined hopes brought on an- 
other fit of sobbing, and the boy’s face was pitifully 
twisted by his efforts to hide the intensity of his unhappi- 
ness. Cigarette caught him by the shoulders and shook 
him with rough good-nature. 

“Don’t cry, Joseph,” he said. “Laugh, man, laugh! 
This may prove the brightest day in your life, instead 
of its darkest one. All you’ve got to do is to keep your 
mouth tight shut. I don’t blame for you taking that 
money: I never blame anybody for anything; but I’ll 
break my rule and blame you for an everlasting ass if 
you ever breathe a word about your harmless little pil- 
f erings. ’ ’ 


The Three Thieves 


31 


The boy’s sobs ceased and his eyes grew wide. But 
the question on his lips was lost in the noise of an open- 
ing door and of the porter’s excited voice. 

‘'Step out into the lodge, please, Joseph.” 

Pushing the boy before them, Cigarette and Kurt left 
the store-room. In the center of the lodge stood Zie- 
witsch : 

“You have a kind heart, brother, I see,” he said to the 
porter. “You have cheered the durance of our innocent 
prisoner by allowing him some company. Grief shared 
is grief diminished. These — er — gentlemen are friends 
of yours?” 

‘ ‘ Of my dear sister in Belgium, Herr Graf, ’ ’ answered 
the porter. Cigarette bowed, and Kurt chewed the brim 
of his hat to hide his laughter. 

“Charmed to make their acquaintance,” Ziewitsch 
continued. “And I am glad too of their presence here 
as witnesses. I have just had a conference with our 
Regent, and he requests you to set Joseph at liberty. 
My missing note is found; I had mislaid it myself. 
Moreover, now that I see the boy in a clear light, I am 
disposed to believe that it was not he whom I met in 
the corridor. I am more grieved over my mistake than 
I can say, and here, before you all, I ask his pardon most 
humbly . 9 9 

Turning towards Joseph, he put his arm around the 
astonished boy’s shoulder and led him to a far corner, 
near the door, so that Cigarette could only catch a sen- 
tence here and there. 

“As some slight expression of my regret . . . your 
tuition-fees and ten kronen each month for current ex- 
penses, until your studies are completed. . . . And you 
shall come and visit me in the seminary every Sun- 
day. ... You accept ? . . . But you must ; I ask it as a 
favor. . . . Please — oh, please don’t cry! Where is my 
handkerchief? . . . There, there, wipe your eyes. . . . 
I’m so sorry, so very very sorry.” 

Embarrassed by the boy’s stammering expressions of 
gratitude, Ziewitsch hurried away; and, as his black 
cassock swished out of the lodge, Joseph came towards 


32 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

Cigarette with an idiotic grin of joy on his tear-stained 
face. Slowly he surveyed the mysterious person before 
him ; the dusty clothes, the shock of black hair, the 
mischievous sparkling eyes. Then, resting a chapped red 
hand on each hip, he nodded his head with all the stolid 
assurance of his peasant forefathers. 

“It wasn’t the Herr Graf at all,” he said. “ ’Twas 
you that did it, not him. And I wish I was your brother 
too. ’ ’ 

Outside the lodge, a bell clanged through the re-echo- 
ing corridors. 

“Dinner,” exclaimed Joseph. “And to-day I mustn’t 
he late. When shall I see you two again ? ’ ’ 

“When God wills,” Cigarette answered. “It may be 
that you will meet us tramping along the roadside, while 
you drive past in your doctor’s carriage. Then it will be 
our turn to ask, and yours to give. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ But your names ? How shall I know you ? ’ ’ 

One corner of the porter’s table was covered with dust. 
Bending down, Cigarette traced a sign there with his 
forefinger. 

“It is the Six-Pointed-Cross,” he exclaimed. “Who- 
ever comes to you in its name is of my kindred. Be to 
him what I have been to you. . . . No ; I shan’t answer a 
single question. Run to dinner. Good appetite to you ; 
and my compliments to Graf Ziewitsch, your friend. ’ ’ 

Joseph departed, the sound of his receding footsteps 
mingling with the tramp of heavier feet and the soft 
rustle of many cassocks. The Fathers and theological 
students were passing along the corridors to the Re- 
fectory. When the house was quiet again, the red- 
cheeked lay-brother stole away with many mysterious 
winks, and soon returned, bringing his own dinner and 
two tin pails of hot soup. Unable to decide who should 
take the single chair, the host and his two guests began 
their meal sitting side by side on the edge of the dusty 
table. The porter chuckled as he swung his legs to and 
fro. 

‘ ‘ Our Rector will get a cold dinner this noon, and our 
Regent, too, ’ ’ he said. ‘ ‘ If they knew that the thief were 


The Three Thieves 


33 


an outsider, I don’t believe they’d even bother to have 
him arrested; but so long as he may turn out to be a 
member of our own College, they can’t rest easy. And 
so, as Joseph has been proved innocent, they’re going to 
make one last effort to find the guilty person. From now 
on I’m to keep a sharp eye on every one who enters the 
House just before dinner-time; and the Rector intends 
to stay away from the Refectory and to patrol the corri- 
dors in felt slippers. He has asked the Regent to help 
him. Between the three of us, we hope to waylay the 
thief when he makes his round of the empty rooms. ’ ’ 

Cigarette raised the soup-can to his lips and winked 
over the edge at the chuckling brother. 

‘ ‘ Here ’s success to your enterprise. But I ’m sorry for 
the poor Rector. To think of his having to go without 
dinner, while the thief is eating so comfortably in the 
porter’s lodge.” 

The brother’s soup seemed to choke him, and his face 
grew crimson. He began to splutter incoherently. But 
Cigarette waved a spoon at him and commanded silence. 

“Pray go on with your soup. Why spoil our dinner 
by an unedifying discussion ? I suppose that you needed 
the money for your dear sister in Belgium. You see, I 
happen to know that you went into Graf Ziewitsch’s 
room, and had just time to escape, when you heard him 
returning unexpectedly from the Refectory. These little 
noon-visits of yours have apparently been going on for 
some months ; and, as you let poor J oseph lie under sus- 
picion, I should be disposed to make trouble, were I not 
inclined to mercy by this pail of excellent soup, and — by 
your lively interest in my native Belgium. . . . But 
aren’t you ashamed of yourself, now? And you a Re- 
ligious, too? How about your vow of poverty?” 

“I haven’t taken solemn vows, only simple ones,” the 
porter remonstrated. “And the truth is that I wasn’t 
much interested in the money itself. I was hunting 
around for stamps. ’ ’ 

“Well, God bless us every one,” ejaculated Cigarette. 
“Do you mean to tell me that this is a case of collector’s 
mania ? ’ ’ 


34 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

The lay-brother threw back the straw mattress of his 
narrow bed and brought out a package, which he opened 
with the tenderest care. Inside was nothing but an old 
copy-book, containing a wretchedly incomplete collection 
of the most ordinary stamps pasted across the pages in 
irregular rows. The youngest school boy would have 
blushed to call it his, but the lay-brother turned the 
smudged leaves with sparkling eyes. 

“It’s the only thing that I’ve got to interest me,” he 
said. 4 ‘The students of our College come from all parts 
of the world, and I used to pick up their old envelopes 
around the House. But the servants, who bring the 
young gentlemen their letters, began begging for the for- 
eign stamps ; and so, to outwit their greediness, I got into 
the habit of searching the waste-paper baskets in the 
students’ rooms, while the whole College was at dinner. 
Then I noticed a few odd coins lying about; and I — I 
wanted an album so badly for my collection. Not a cheap 
thing, but a really decent book with colored coats-of- 
arms, of the different countries. . . . Oh, you can’t un- 
derstand what all this means to me. I haven’t even 
a single copper that I can rightly call my own ; and it ’s 
wrong for me even to hoard up these stamps. But they 
are just my whole life. And at night, when I’m alone, I 
spend hours looking them over and over. ... You won’t 
say anything, will you ? I ’ve been hospitable to you both, 
and I’ve owned up to the thieving. As for Belgium, I 
was only interested in it because I thought you might get 
me some stamps from there. I haven’t any sister in an 
Antwerp convent. That was a lie.” 

Cigarette slipped down from the table and held out his 
hand. 

. ‘ ‘ Sir, ’ ’ he said, 1 1 1 honor you. I have read of million- 
aires who did not shrink from bribery and crime if 
thereby they could secure a canvas of Titian or a speci- 
men of Cellini ’s handiwork. They wanted these things ; 
they got what they wanted. And that I respect. I 
have heard, too, that book lovers are all dishonest at heart, 
and would cheerfully cut a dear friend’s throat for the 
sake of a rare edition. I respect them too. But never, 


The Three Thieves 


35 


never have I found mention anywhere of a Jesuit who 
broke his vow of poverty and endangered his immortal 
soul on account of a few old stamps. Sir, you impress 
me. It is, indeed, a privilege to meet you, for you are al- 
most great. Allow me once more, sir, to shake your 
hand.” 

The porter grinned and poked a huge forkful of cab- 
bage into his mouth. He did not at all understand what 
Cigarette had said, and yet he felt sure that his secret 
was quite safe with this weird pilgrim from Belgium. 
Cigarette continued to gaze at him respectfully, until 
both Kurt and himself had finished their soup. Then he 
picked up his hat. 

‘ 4 One small matter remains for my attention , 9 1 he said. 
“But I shall have plenty of time to arrange it, as there 
will be a good fifteen minutes yet before the College leaves 
the Refectory. Here, Kurt, take my knapsack, as well as 
thine own, and meet me at the gate of the old Botanical 
Garden. I showed thee the place this morning, although 
I neglected to mention that the garden’s back wall abuts 
on the courtyard of this reverend house. Keep an eye 
out for me, and don’t leave the gate till I come. My 
morning’s work here will be incomplete if I cannot clear 
both J oseph and our stamp-collecting friend from all sus- 
picion by showing Father Rector the real thief. ’ ’ 

With a promise of countless Belgian stamps he took 
leave of the puzzled lay-brother, and went out with Kurt 
into the corridor. The porter tugged at his rope ; the in- 
ner door swung open, and Cigarette, with a last whis- 
pered warning, pushed Kurt outside into the narrow 
entrance-hall. Then, closing the door softly after the 
boy, he slipped back to the lodge and turned the key on his 
good-natured host, who imagined that both his guests 
from Belgium had left the house together. 

Cigarette was now alone in the silent passage. He 
tiptoed upstairs to the first floor. Here another long cor- 
ridor ran the whole length of the house in an unbroken 
line of white, except where it opened, half-way down, on a 
back staircase. As Cigarette was passing this second 
landing he heard a soft step coming up from below. 


36 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

On one side of the hall was a deep closet. Cigarette 
glanced into it, but its dust and evil smells disgusted him, 
and he crossed the passage to a door opposite, which gave 
on an empty room. He took refuge inside, leaving the 
door slightly ajar. 

The steps came nearer, and, peering out, he saw a very 
bald undersized man in a voluminous cassock, who was 
pattering along the corridor in felt slippers. The new- 
comer stopped in front of the closet. Cigarette had left 
it standing open, and now he thanked heaven that he had 
not tried to hide there, for the robust little Regent found 
himself a chair, placed it underneath the dusty shelf, and 
then sat down in the recess. 

He took out his Breviary. But after a moment ’s read- 
ing, he seemed to realize that his feet at least were visible 
from one end of the passage. So he closed the closet door 
upon himself, until he was quite in the dark, except for a 
single ray of light that fell upon his open book. Evi- 
dently he considered this a good post of vantage, where he 
could watch for the thief, and at the same time finish a 
neglected office. 

He had scarcely thus entrenched himself when from the 
other end of the corridor appeared a long, thin shape — 
the Rector. He was an old, very tall man, with sunken 
but glowing eyes ; he, too, was in felt slippers, and glanced 
alertly from side to side as he stalked along in lonely dig- 
nity, approaching the closet from the side uncommanded 
by the crack of its open door. He reached the room 
where Cigarette was hiding. 

At the same moment, in the dark closet, a mixture of 
dust and floating cobweb drifted across the Regent’s 
mumbling lips. The pious soul spat discreetly, and be- 
fore beginning the last “ Antiphon ” all over again, gave a 
slight cough. 

The Rector stopped short. A cough? It had come 
from that closet, and now he saw that the door was ajar. 
Without doubt some one was hidden inside. . . . The 
thief ! 

The Rector was a strategist. He knew that he was not 
a strong man, and he suspected that the robber might be. 


The Three Thieves 37 

So he chose the safest method of capture. He decided to 
lock the rascal in. 

He stepped very softly up to the door, and, without 
making the slightest noise, closed it tight. Then he felt 
for the key. 

It had been taken away. 

And before he could slip the rusty bolt, the thief began 
to push from the inside. 

The Regent, seeing the light fade suddenly from his 
Breviary, and finding himself in the dark, thought that 
the door had fallen to of itself, and gave the lower panel a 
gentle kick, as beseemed a Religious in the midst of a 
1 ‘ Gloria Patri.” 

But the door would not open. 

He said “in saecula sasculorum, Amen/’ and kicked 
harder. The door held. He stood up and shoved. 

It was then that he caught the heavy breathing of 
some one on the outside. The thief, of course! The 
villain had seen him enter the closet and had locked him 
in, so that he might rifle the rooms at his leisure. 

What was to be done? The Regent was the son of a 
thick-set, square- jawed peasant, and he did not hesitate. 

‘ ‘ Let me out, you scum of the world, ’ ’ he shouted, and 
threw his whole weight against the door. 

It gave a little. 

He put his broad shoulder to the panel, and braced one 
sturdy leg against the back wall. Outside he could hear 
the thief panting and groaning. 

One more push ! 

The door swung open. Out dashed the Regent and 
seized upon his adversary. A tall, .black shape grappled 
valiantly with the smaller one, for the Rector was no 
coward at a pinch. Nevertheless he felt a sharp twinge 
of rheumatism in his back, and had opened his mouth to 
cry out for help, when from the opposite side of the hall, 
just behind his own shoulder, he heard the unmistakable 
sound of a smothered laugh. 

The Regent heard it too. Releasing his adversary, he 
lifted his shiny bald head, and set his round horn spec- 
tacles to rights on his broad nose. 


38 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

“Yon — Reverend Father Rector?” he gasped. 

The other Jesuit was too thoroughly out of breath to 
reply. He stared grimly at the little man in front of 
him, and then, with a single motion, the two black figures 
faced about. 

There, in the open door of a student’s room, stood an 
utter stranger ; a most remarkable person, with disordered 
black hair and shabby clothes, who was rolling from side 
to side in spasms of helpless mirth. 

‘ ‘ The thief, ’ 9 panted the Rector. 

“Pardon me, Reverend Father,” said the Regent, “if 
I seem to push by you with undue haste . 9 ’ 

And he made a dash for the impertinent intruder. 

But Cigarette dodged and started off down the hall, 
with the Regent close behind him, and the Rector bringing 
up the rear, almost winded but undaunted still. Down 
the stairs they clattered, Cigarette keeping only a little 
ahead of his pursuers, so as to lend zest to the chase. 

In the Refectory, which opened on a large garden, the 
students were still at dinner ; and from a high desk above 
the lines of crowded tables the Reader-for-the-day was 
droning out the edifying biography of some Jesuit mis- 
sionary. All at once he stopped, and began making wild, 
mad motions with his hands. 

But every head was devoutly bent over the last dish 
of prunes; no one saw the Reader’s antics. 

At last he broke the silence of discipline with an un- 
holy yell. 

4 4 Look — look — out of the window — look. ’ ’ 

He howled in his native tongue. And, though hardly 
any one understood Polish, the whole room glanced up, 
followed his frantic gestures, and crowded to the win- 
dows. 

Out under the trees of the garden dashed a strange 
man, holding his sides and shouting with laughter. After 
him pattered the short fat Regent, his cassock held high 
with both hands, and his round black legs twinkling in 
the felt slippers that flip-flapped nimbly over the soft 
ground. 

And, wonder of all wonders, behind him came the 


The Three Thieves 


39 


Father Rector, speechless with exhaustion, and beating 
the air with his thin arms. 

On the three ran. But the Regent, feeling his beretta 
slipping from his shiny crown, put up one hand to hold 
it on tight, let his cassock drop, and, tripping in the heavy 
black folds, went rolling head over heels into the midst of 
a flower-bed. 

The Rector stopped to help his colleague out of the 
geraniums. 

This fall of the Mighty brought the students pushing 
and babbling from the Refectory. Some of them sur- 
rounded the panting Jesuits. Others ran after the thief. 
But all that they ever saw of him was one well-shaped leg 
in old leather breeches disappearing over the wall of the 
College garden. Beyond this wall they did not dare to 
go, since it marked the extreme boundary of their ‘ 4 Com- 
munity Enclosure”; and before the Rector could get 
breath enough to give them permission to pass it they had 
lost all chance of overtaking their quarry. 

The Regent, however, was an optimist. 

“We must,” he said to the students that gathered 
round him, “consider the advantages of the situation. 
That wicked person will never return, and now we know 
that the thief was not one of our own people. This puts 
an end to our sense of insecurity. ’ ’ 

But the Rector had been a cavalry officer in his youth, 
and was not so easily pacified. 

“ I ’d have caught the rogue, ’ ’ he muttered, “ if I hadn ’t 
wasted my strength on that idiotic closet and been forced 
Jo run in these infernal skirts. ’ ’ 

The Regent looked at him as reprovingly as he dared. 
And the Rector’s shoulders stooped more than ever as 
he turned away towards the house, blaming himself 
severely for the spark of sinful pride that still flickered 
in his kind old heart. 

“The College,” said the Regent, “will now return to 
dinner. ’ 9 

The theologians trooped back into the Refectory; the 
Reader climbed into his high desk and began again the 
biography of the edifying Jesuit saint. He was a little 


40 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


flustered still, and read the same page twice over without 
noticing his mistake. But no one else noticed it either. 
Not even the bald-headed little Regent, pretending to 
enjoy his cold prunes at the end of the long table. 


Sweating under the weight of two knapsacks, Kurt was 
walking impatiently up and down near the entrance to 
the Botanical Garden. He heard a light step, and Cigar- 
ette, breathless but smiling, came hurrying towards him 
out through the open gate. 

“It’s lucky for me,” he said, “that the good Inns- 
bruckers take less interest in botany than our red-cheeked 
porter takes in stamps.” The whole garden was de- 
serted. . . . “Give me my pack, and away we go. Be- 
fore sunset we must be clear of this town and well on our 
way towards the Brenner Pass.” 

“But I thought we were going to stay awhile,” Kurt 
complained. “We haven ’t seen Innsbruck at all yet. ’ ’ 

“Never mind. We’re better off than any tourists who 
have ever visited this place before us. We’re carrying 
away more than we brought. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ I don ’t see how, unless thou meanest more shameless- 
ness and sin. This whole morning long thou hast done 
nothing but tell one lie after another. ’ ’ 

“And with what glorious results! Consider our new 
possessions. The thanks of a future physician ; the grati- 
tude of a religious stamp-collector; and every year the 
mass of a happy useful priest. As for those petty lies 
of mine — well, as we walk along, I shall ask thee to repeat 
some of the interesting stories that thou wert kind enough 
to tell that unsuspecting Jesuit about our beloved home in 
Belgium. ’ ’ 


ADVENTURE SECOND 

THE WHITE DEATH AND THE BLACK 


Down a stretch of dusty road, in the early freshness of a 
summer’s morning, Cigarette and Kurt came swinging 
along side by side, making for Toblach at the head of the 
Ampezzo valley. During the last month they had been 
pushing steadily southward, and, having climbed the 
Brenner Pass, were now on the outskirts of Italian Tyrol, 
where such few people as they met either had no knowl- 
edge of German or else disdained to use the tongue of the 
“Austrian Oppressor.” 

As they passed a wayside church Cigarette pointed to a 
group of peasants on their knees outside the open door. 

‘ ‘ Let us hear mass too. ’ ’ 

Kurt remonstrated. The cool morning hours were too 
delicious to be wasted inside a stuffy little church. 

“But I have a great desire to offer thanks,” persisted 
his companion. “I had not expected to settle that affair 
of Graf Ziewitsch ’s so easily. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ The girl was a decent sort, ’ ’ admitted Kurt, turning 
in reluctantly at the church gate. “She’d never have 
bothered the Herr Graf at all if it hadn’t been for her 
father. That old miser was merciless. And he’d never 
have yielded even to thy influence had’st thou not 
thought to play the priest and to terrify him with threats 
of hell fire.” 

“Religion is a marvelous power here in Tyrol. That’s 
why I want to pay my respects to it now. ’ ’ 

When the mass was ended the two friends walked on 
in silence. At an abrupt turn of the road Kurt caught 
sight of the glimmering Dolomite peaks that rose behind 
Toblach on either side of the opening valley. 

“We’ll be in amongst them soon,” he cried, pointing 
forwards. “And I hate them so.” 

41 


42 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

“And fear them too. I do at least: although I wonder 
at myself, there is so much beauty in their stern domi- 
nation. They remind me of the faith that flourishes here. 
I respect it ; but at times it terrifies me, for it’s such an 
intense reality, such an elemental force, that it ^becomes 
unspeakably cruel when abused or misdirected.” 

Kurt triumphed gloriously. 

“Haven’t I always said that it’s better to have too little 
religion than too much ? ’ ’ 

Cigarette shook his head, but made no answer. 

On reaching Toblach they passed through the village 
itself with its long rows of barn-like hotels, and kept on 
up the valley, asking questions on this side and on that, 
until they found what they sought, a good-natured peas- 
ant, the owner of a small farm, who promised them a 
sleeping-place in his hayloft. They had planned to 
spend several days in climbing some of the less dangerous 
peaks before hurrying onwards into Italian territory at 
the further end of the valley ; but the afternoon was al- 
ready too far gone for a long walk, so they strolled back 
into the village and ordered supper in front of a small 
inn on the market-place, where they could watch the gay 
crowd of peasants, tourists, and guides. 

The tables that stood in the open air were soon crowded. 
At one of them sat a group of northern Germans, dressed 
in Tirolese clothes so stiffly new and unsoiled that their 
unpicturesque garishness offended the eye. Between the 
ends of the black leather breeches and the gay green tops 
of the knit gray stockings the virgin whiteness of pudgey 
knees stood out in laughable contrast to the brown bare 
legs of the passing peasants, who snickered good na- 
turedly at the self-evident complacency of the inexpe- 
rienced tourists. 

Kurt soon grew interested in one of these Prussians — a 
pale nervous young man with the traditional blond beard 
of a physician or professor. But Cigarette did not share 
this enthusiasm ; he was watching a soldier in the uniform 
of the “ Kaiser- Jaeger, ” who was sipping his wine quite 
alone at a table very near the street. Kurt gave his 
friend’s arm a sharp pinch. 


The White Death and the Black 43 


“If thou wilt not look at my Prussian, at least look at 
this mad monk. ’ ’ 

In front of the inn, a curious figure was moving slowly 
among the groups gathered in the market-place; a gi- 
gantic man, whose long hair and unkempt shaggy beard 
concealed every line and feature of his face, except two 
burning rolling eyes that shone out like flashes of light- 
ning, seen through thick underbrush at night. He was 
barefoot, and around his chafed muddy ankles fluttered 
the ragged edges of a nondescript brown habit, girt about 
his thin loins with a frayed and knotted rope. He gave 
no greetings; he looked neither right nor left; but the 
people drew back reverently to let him pass. One or two 
of the men, however, muttered angrily and spat on the 
ground. 

Cigarette ordered a second measure of the thin white 
wine, and spoke to the waitress who brought it, a round- 
faced peasant girl with dazzling white teeth. 

“That is the Holy Man of Castel’ di Monte/ ’ she ex- 
plained. “He lives half-way up the mountain yonder, 
in a cell that our people helped him to build. Who he 
is and whence he came, no one knows. But he has the 
second-sight ; and the Holy Mother of God visits him at 
his devotions. From Her he obtains many favors, espe- 
cially for our women-folk, who hold him in great rever- 
ence. The men, alas, are sometimes blasphemous; they 
say that he is not a holy monk at all. May the saints for- 
give them ! ’ ’ 

When the girl had moved away, walking lightly with 
rolling hips, Cigarette turned his attention again to the 
soldier. There was something unusual about the man’s 
stiff attitude; and beneath the table, his hands were 
clasped so tightly together that they trembled under 
the strain. 

Half an hour went by. Then the monk’s weird figure 
appeared once more. But this time, in crossing the 
market-place, he passed closer to the inn than before, 
and his muddy skirts brushed against the table where 
the soldier sat. The man’s clenched trembling hands 
sprang suddenly apart. 


44 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


“Ah-h-h!” sighed Cigarette, as if he felt the easing 
of some long tension. 

Women began to scream; the buxom waitress let a 
tray of brimming glasses fall, and rushed forward. 

“Where is my wife — my Nina — my wife?” Above 
the shrill confusion the soldier’s deep angry voice 
boomed out. He had caught the monk by the shoulders 
and was shaking him roughly. 

Without the slightest change of expression, the Holy 
Man laid hold of the soldier’s hands and removed them 
gently from his shoulders. 

‘ ‘ Speak, swine of the earth. . . . What hast thou done 
with her? 

Two older men tried to seize the brawler, who was 
waving his peasant fists up and down in front of the 
monk ’s face. But he tossed their arms aside, and caught 
his enemy by the flowing beard. The monk’s eyes 
blazed: yet his dignity was unshaken; he neither 
moved nor spoke. 

A stupifying clamor arose, drowning the soldier’s 
voice. Around him and his silent opponent closed an 
excited crowd. 

When it parted again, the monk had disappeared. 
The soldier crept back to the inn like a whipped dog 
and dropped listlessly into his chair, still mumbling in- 
articulate defiance. 

The landlord pleaded; Marie, the waitress, wept. It 
was all useless. One by one the guests called in whis- 
pers for their scores and hurried away. Sacrilege had 
been committed, if not in the inn itself, at least very 
near it; and the likelihood of a sudden vengeance from 
heaven upon the accursed spot made it wiser to be gone 
betimes. Even the German tourists, who amidst all the 
confusion had continued to discuss in loud tones their 
plans for the next day’s climb, were depressed by the 
silence around them, and took themselves off to their 
hotel, beautiful clothes and all. 

Kurt would gladly have followed their example; but 
Cigarette would not move, and when the place was 
empty except for the soldier and themselves, he left 


The White Death and the Black 45 


his own table and, beckoning Kurt to follow, sat down 
beside the bowed figure in the light-gray uniform. 

“A few months ago in Vienna,” he said, as if speak- 
ing to himself, ‘ ‘ a fellow was shot down on the street by 
a sergeant, whose home he had ruined. The soldier 
was in the ‘ Kaiser- Jaegar.’ ... I can’t remember his 
name. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ But I can, though, ’ ’ interposed a voice from the other 
side of the table. “He belonged to my regiment, and I 
was just thinking about him.” 

The soldier raised his heavy eyes; and, stretching out 
one arm, pointed to the red chevrons on his sleeve. 

“The day after that sergeant was degraded by the 
court-martial, I got these stripes. And I remember say- 
ing to myself that, if I lost them, it wouldn ’t be through 
my wife. She might be a bit bad-tempered, but a 
straighter woman never walked.” 

“Have you changed your opinion of her since then?” 

The soldier lounged back in his chair and surveyed 
the questioner distrustfully. But the look of Cigarette’s 
clothes seemed to reassure him, for he became apologetic 
at once. 

“ ’Twas your voice I didn’t like. Thought you were 
an aristocrat or some newspaper spy. But I understand 
now, and I — I thank you for coming to talk with me. 
Served in the ‘ Kaiserlichen ’ yourself, perhaps?” 

“I have had that honor,” said Cigarette. 

“But not from these parts,” answered the soldier, 
reaching his great hand across the table to grasp Ciga- 
rette’s tapering fingers. “If you were, you’d not be 
sitting here at my side, comrade though you might be. 
Haven’t I struck a priest? Why, even the dogs will 
avoid me, until I’ve done all sorts of penance. And I 
won’t do that, — I won’t! My leave’s only three days 
old, but I might as well go back to the regiment to- 
morrow. ’ ’ 

“And desert your wife?” 

* ‘ But I don ’t know where she is ! ” 

“Does that monk know then?” 

The soldier leaned forward, and lowered his voice. 


46 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


‘ ‘ He must. But what can I do ? Holy or not, he has 
ruled this village for years. The parish priest is jealous 
of him, yet he doesn’t dare complain to the Prince-« 
Bishop, because the people would have his life, if the 
monk were sent away. Some of them think him a 
saint; others fear him as a kind of weather-magician, 
who has power to protect or destroy their crops. And 
the women are all his devoted slaves. At the great 
festivals, they go to him for absolution. The parish 
priest isn’t good enough, and he doesn’t know how to 
frighten them. All sorts of stories are afloat about the 
monk’s chapel. A lot of foolishness! Water that bub- 
bles up hot from hell; and a stone coffin, where the 
women lie all night to do penance for their sins. Oh, 
that fellow knows his business. Before he absolves a 
girl, he sends her into fits of terror. And she likes it; 
she confides to her friends the torments she has endured ; 
and the other women are attracted by the gruesomeness 
and mystery. Men are different; none of them visit 
the monk except a few totards who want to make heaven 
a perfectly sure thing. . . . All this sounds harmless 
enough, I’ll admit. But — but — some of the girls, who 
went up that mountain, have never come back. Five 
or six of them; perhaps more. Yet nobody dare say 
a word to the police. . . . The monk must keep those 
women hidden in some secret room. Pfui, the old hypo- 
crite! . . . And he has got hold of my Nina too. . . . 
Isn’t it enough to drive a man mad? I come home on 
leave ... I find my house empty and my little boy 
with his grandmother, who tries to deceive me with a 
pack of lies. Then to-night, for the first time, I hear 
from Marie, the waitress at this inn, that my wife was 
seen two weeks ago on her way up the mountain. No 
one has set eyes on her since. Of course Marie swears 
that nothing can have happened to her; the Holy Man 
has only sent her off on some long pilgrimage on account 
of her sins. A likely tale! And yet I’m helpless — 
helpless. ’ ’ 

“You had the monk by the throat an hour ago,” said 


The White Death and the Black 47 


Cigarette. “Why not try the same method again, when 
you won’t be interrupted?” 

‘ * Oh, I was an idiot to lay hands on him. This morn- 
ing, there were a dozen men who ’d have helped me break 
into his cell. But now, not a soul in the village will 
even speak to me, because I’ve committed sacrilege and 
might bring them bad luck. ’ ’ 

“Why don’t you go to Castel’ di Monte yourself?” 

“I? . . . Go alone? ...” 

The high color disappeared from the soldier’s flushed 
cheeks. His forefathers for generations had been banned 
by fear of the supernatural, and in spite of his own be- 
lief, he could not free himself from the domination of 
this inherited terror. 

“No, no,” he added softly. “I shouldn’t want to go 
up there alone. Neither would any other man in this 
whole valley.” 

“If you will show us the way,” suggested Cigarette, 
“my brother and I will be glad to bear you company.” 

The soldier’s face lit up; he threw back his sunken 
shoulders and rubbed his hands together. 

“And I thought you were a Prussian tourist,” he ex- 
claimed. “May God pardon me! My name is Toni 
Menardi. Favor me with yours, and let us drink to 
our abiding friendship.” 

Menardi and Cigarette proceeded at once to hold a 
council of war. As the monk was visited constantly by 
the faithful during the daytime, the only safe plan 
was to start up the mountain in the late afternoon and 
lie hid in the woods, till darkness came on and the Holy 
Man was alone. Yet the three adventurers must not 
leave the village together, for some one might suspect 
their purpose and warn their enemy: so it seemed 
wisest to join forces half-way to Castel’ di Monte at a 
certain cross road on the mountain-side, where Cigarette 
promised that he and Kurt would meet Menardi towards 
sundown of the next day. This plan of campaign once 
arranged, Cigarette insisted on leaving the soldier to the 
tender ministrations of Marie, who seemed to have for- 


48 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


gotten his sacrilegious attack on the monk, and sat down 
with him over a fresh measure of wine as soon as the 
others had started up the valley towards their sleeping- 
place in the peasant’s hayloft. 

While walking along the dark road, Cigarette laughed 
and chatted with an almost boyish delight at the pros- 
pect of to-morrow’s adventure. But Kurt was silent 
and far from comfortable. Like the soldier, he felt in 
his blood the stirrings of inherited superstition, and 
would rather have faced a line of belching cannon than 
that solitary monk who, if indeed he were not in direct 
communication with heaven, was doubtless in touch with 
powers from another place more terrible still. To con- 
fess these fears and refuse to share in any battle with 
the Hosts of Darkness was more than Kurt dared to do. 
Nevertheless he rebelled in spirit, hoping that something 
might happen to prevent the expedition; and that same 
night, while tossing about in the hay, he had such fear- 
ful dreams about bearded monks who conjured up devils 
with fiery eyes and red hairy tails, that he rolled over 
close to Cigarette and held tight to his friend’s hand, 
until he dropped off at last into an unbroken sleep. 

When he woke next morning, the sky was cloudless. 
Against the deep blue, the vividly colored peaks stood 
out in all their somewhat gaudy splendor; and yet 
there was a feeling of breathless tension in the air, that 
made the owner of the hayloft prophesy a bad storm 
before sunset. Kurt, who was still haunted by his 
dreams, wished secretly that it might come at once; 
and he seemed so depressed that Cigarette, thinking to 
cheer him, took him down again into the village and let 
him stare at the hordes of tourists buzzing about on the 
verandas of the crowded hotels. 

Kurt soon singled out the group of Germans whom 
he had seen the night before. Hung about with ice- 
picks, coils of rope, and other complicated unnecessary 
matters, they looked even more glorious than usual ; but 
in spite of it all, they were evidently not in the best of 
tempers, and when the youngish man with the yellow 
professional beard caught sight of Cigarette passing by 


The White Death and the Black 49 


with Kurt, he called out to him in the rasping nasal 
tone of military Prussia: 

“Aeh, you there. — Aeh, wait.” 

As Cigarette paid no attention, he hurried down the 
steps, glanced sideways at Cigarette’s worn clothes, and 
then tapped him patronizingly on the shoulder. 

“Aeh, glad to earn a few extra kronen, aeh? — Fellow 
engaged to carry lunch-basket — hasn’t turned up — can’t 
wait any longer. — Come along, you. — Be well paid. — 
Understand?” 

“I am exceedingly sorry,” answered Cigarette with 
even politeness; “but I am otherwise engaged.” 

Here was the chance for which Kurt had prayed. 
Marveling at his own daring, he seized it instinctively. 

“I could go with you, sir,” he stammered. 

“Good — you’ll not regret it — come along,” snapped 
the Prussian, and started back to the hotel veranda. 

His sleeves were rolled up, and as he turned away and 
lifted his hand to pull his stiff embroidered suspenders 
into place, the opened cuff slipped still further up one 
elbow, and Cigarette had a glimpse of the man’s upper 
arm. The flesh was inflamed and covered with a net- 
work of tiny red dots. 

“Kurt, I’d rather thou didst not go climbing with 
these people.” 

There was an unusual tone of anxiety in Cigarette’s 
voice. But Kurt cut him short with excited protests. 
The climb wouldn’t be tiring; he would be well paid, 
and their common purse was almost empty. As for the 
expedition to Castel’ di Monte, it could get along well 
enough without his help. And, anyway, the tourists on 
their way down the mountain would surely pass near 
the monk’s chapel; he could leave them there and join 
Cigarette, in case he was needed, really, really needed. 

‘ ‘ Thou art but a poor liar, little Kurt, ’ ’ said Cigarette. 
“Why, thine eyes are big this minute with the fear of 
ghosts and devils; and in thine heart there isn’t the 
faintest intention of ever meeting me at Castel’ di Monte. 
— But thou hast accepted this man ’s service, and art free 
to follow thine own will. — Yet one word of warning. 


50 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


That young German will bear watching. In case of any 
sudden danger trust nothing to him. He might do his 
best, but he can’t depend on his own nerves; he hasn’t a 
sound one left in his whole body. My soldier friend may 
have so much religion that its terrors make a coward of 
him at times; but I suspect that this fair-bearded Herr 
Doctor is the greater weakling of the two, simply be- 
cause he has so little. If thou shouldst see him take out 
a glass phial or something shiny from a small leather- 

covered case, then be on thy guard to No, I’ll say 

no more. Thou couldst do nothing to help or hinder. 
We must chance it. And perhaps there is a lesson here 
for thee. Run along, and good-by till to-morrow morn- 
ing, when I expect to find thee snoring at my side in the 
good farmer’s hay.” 

Kurt was far too impatient to pay much attention to 
what his friend said ; he hurried off to the hotel veranda, 
where he was soon laden down with a basket and a 
heavy knapsack. 

As he tramped through the village behind the group 
of tourists he felt very much alone; this was the first 
time that he had been separated from Cigarette, and he 
was sorely tempted to throw down his load and turn 
back. But then he thought of the old monk’s devil- 
haunted cell and trudged stolidly on. Prom such broken 
bits of talk as he overheard he learned that the man 
with the light beard was a physician, a Dr. Evers ; Kurt 
kept close to his side, but could not see that he shirked 
hardship or avoided danger. Once or twice, indeed, he 
dropped behind the others, yet he always rejoined them 
soon afterwards and in the best of spirits. 

The climb proved a long one. The sun was very hot ; 
no breeze was stirring, and Kurt’s knees were trembling 
with fatigue when he reached the small peak where the 
party had planned to take their luncheon. 

The descent, however, proved comparatively easy, es- 
pecially for Kurt, who had so little to carry. The whole 
party was in great good spirits, and laughed at the 
anxieties of their old guide because he so constantly 
warned them to keep close together and to beware of 


The White Death and the Black 51 

loose pieces of rock; the soft formation of the Dolomite 
range having always a tendency to crumble in small 
masses from the slope, thus forming a constant menace 
to amateur climbers, who, in the careless hurry of 
descent, often set in motion these detached layers of 
stone. 

About half-way down the mountain Dr. Evers, in spite 
of the guide’s warning, dropped behind the others once 
more ; and Kurt, who had turned to stare back at him, 
saw him draw something from an inner pocket as he 
disappeared in the shelter of a jutting ledge. But Kurt 
was in no mood for loitering. He had already started 
on again when he heard a shrill scream. 

He shouted to the others and ran back. 

Behind the ledge Evers lay helpless on the ground, his 
right leg covered by a large stone that had rolled down 
on him from above. He had not seen it, or even heard 
it coming, so completely had his attention been absorbed 
in something else. Now he was shrieking with pain, 
and the noise of his agony almost drove Kurt mad. 

The guide came hurrying up with the rest of the party, 
and the tiny landslide was soon cleared away. The 
doctor’s screams ceased; he looked down once at his foot, 
and then fell back in a dead faint. 

His right leg, that lay in an ever-widening pool of 
blood, had been crushed below the knee into a shapeless 
mass of flesh and protruding bits of bone. There was 
no time to lose. The guide slit open the leather breeches, 
whipped a piece of strong cord from his pocket, and 
knotted it around the unhurt part of the upper leg. 
Thrusting his flat horn-handled knife between cord and 
flesh and using it as a lever, he tightened the circle of 
twine until it bit deep down into the grayish-white skin, 
and pressed at last so tightly on the arteries above the 
knee that lower down on the mangled limb the rush of 
blood was gradually checked. 

As soon as this temporary bandage had been made 
secure, the guide divided his party into two divisions. 
With one of these he himself would run down to the 
hotel; the other must climb along the face of the moun- 


52 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


tain to Caster di Monte, where some peasants might be 
found at the monk’s chapel. Thus help would come 
from one place or the other. The wounded man, mean- 
while, was to be left in charge of Kurt, who was given 
a brandy-flask and told exactly how to refasten the 
tourniquet in case it should slip and the bleeding begin 
again. 

The rapid steps of the two parties soon died away; 
and Kurt sat down beside the young doctor, whose white 
face with its sparse yellow beard rested on a half-empty 
knapsack, while his wounded leg was covered with Kurt ’s 
own jacket. The sun dropped behind a high peak on the 
right; twilight came on quickly with leaping expanding 
shadows. Kurt did not feel afraid, but he shuddered a 
little. 

The doctor’s eyelids fluttered. He groaned, softly at 
first. Then as the fainting fit passed the pain seized 
him again by the throat, and his moans rose to a shrill 
whimper, the whimper to a sobbing cry. In his agony 
he began to shriek in hoarse long-drawn screams. 

“It eats into my flesh,” he panted, tossing his head 
from side to side. “Like a ring of red-hot iron. I can’t 
stand it — I can’t — I can’t.” 

Kurt held a brandy-flask to the trembling lips. After 
a few swallows, Evers pushed the boy’s hand aside and 
raised himself slowly on one elbow. 

“When that rock hit me,” he said, “I dropped a 
little leather-covered case. It must have fallen here- 
abouts. ’ ’ 

Kurt had clever eyes. He soon found the case, lying 
face downwards and half-open, exactly as it had been 
knocked from the doctor’s hand. But the moment he 
saw it, some echo of Cigarette’s half-forgotten words 
set his thoughts in motion. “A little leather case — some- 
thing shiny— a glass phial.” What these all might be 
and what their uses, Kurt had not understood ; yet they 
must be dangerous — of that he felt sure. 

“What luck!” murmured the doctor, reaching out for 
the case. “Now get me some water.” 

Kurt turned his back; but before he could find the 


The White Death and the Black 53 


water-bottle, the wounded man had begun to sob like a 
broken-hearted child. 

“The needle’s lost,” he cried. In the palm of his 
hand Kurt saw a small cylinder of gleaming metal. 
“Look for it where you found the case. A long sharp 
point like a hollow needle. Hurry. It’s getting dark.” 

Kurt searched along the hillside. By mere chance the 
glimmer of something bright caught his eye; and, as he 
bent down to pick up the needle-like tip, his fingers 
touched a small glass tube. 

Cigarette had been right after all. The leather case, 
the shiny object, and now the phial! But what could 
Kurt do? Evers had seen him stoop and knew that he 
had found something. The needle, too, seemed harmless 
enough, so he gave it to the doctor; but the phial he 
slipped quickly into his pocket. 

Evers held out his hand with a shout of delight. 
The next moment, however, he was cursing and lament- 
ing once more. 

“0 you ass! 0 you clumsy fool ! You’ve stepped on 
the needle, and its broken. Useless — utterly useless. 
And the pain’s worse than ever. Here, open this case 
for me. I want a glass tube that you’ll find inside, 
filled with white tablets. I must take them internally. 
Don’t stand there gaping. Do as I say.” 

Now Kurt had supposed that what the doctor wanted 
lay hidden in his own pocket; but, to his surprise, there 
really was a second phial in the leather case, and this so 
increased his distrust of the whole mysterious contriv- 
ance, that he said doggedly — 

“No, you can’t have the little bottle. It’s marked 
‘poisdn,’ and the guide didn’t tell me to give you any- 
thing but brandy. ’ ’ 

Evers raged ; he commanded ; then he began to reason, 
to plead with the boy. Was he not a physician, and did 
he not know what was best for him? The “poison- 
label” was a stupid blunder of the chemist’s. Kurt 
should have one — two — three hundred kronen, if he 
would only surrender that tube of white tabloids. With- 
out them, the doctor insisted that he would surely die 


54 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


before the others returned, and his blood be upon Kurt’s 
head for ever and ever. 

Kurt grew uneasy. Suppose that the doctor did die. 
Even Cigarette couldn’t possibly know as much about 
medicines as a trained physician. Besides, his warning 
had been so indefinite. Kurt decided to temporize; he 
would give up the phial in the case, but the other one 
in his pocket he would keep hidden. 

“Here’s }mur medicine, then. But there’s only one 
pill left. ’ ’ 

Evers snatched at the glass tube. 

“Why, it can’t be all used up, it can’t be. I’m sure 
I had more tabloids. Yes, I remember now. In another 
tube. It must have fallen out with the needle. Look 
again. Don ’t you see that I haven ’t a second to lose. ’ ’ 

Kurt made a pretense of a very zealous but unsuccess- 
ful search. 

“Can’t you find it?” cried out the tormented voice 
behind him. Kurt shook his head. “Then it must be 
buried somewhere under the fallen stones. Hopelessly 
lost. Give me the brandy again.” 

From the first tube Evers shook the single remaining 
tabloid; washed it down with a mouthful of the un- 
diluted spirits, and lay back with closed eyes. 

For a few moments he was still. But soon his groans 
began once more, as the pain bit deep and deeper into 
his weakened nerves. Sitting in the broadening shadow 
of a rock, his fingers firmly clasped around the second 
little phial, Kurt tried in vain to shut out the moaning 
voice. 

“That one tabloid was no help. I’m too used to the 
stuff. And the pain’s coming on — and on, like a tide 
never at the full. . . . You, boy? Couldn’t you look 
once more for that other tube?” 

Although Kurt was tempted to yield, the remembrance 
of Cigarette’s warning hardened his heart. Perhaps, 
by-and-by, he might pretend to find that other phial, 
especially if Evers began screaming again. But not yet. 

“It’s too dim now to see,” he said. “Keep up your 
pluck. Help must come within an hour.” 


The White Death and the Black 55 


‘ ‘ An hour ? And I haven ’t been lying here for thirty 
minutes yet. ... To suffer twice as long again as what 
I ’ve suffered already ; — no, — I can ’t. . . . When they do 
come, they 11 have to move me. That’ll be agony ten 
times worse. . . . And then they’ll wash the wound 
. . . disinfect it . . . amputate perhaps. And my heart’s 
weak: they won’t dare risk a big dose of anaesthetics. 
. . . 0 don’t I know? . . . Haven’t I heard in the 
hospitals . . . how the people . . . scream . . . and . . . 
scream ? ’ ’ 

He gasped for breath. Suddenly the pain gripped 
him again with such merciless power that he flung his 
arms about and shrieked, until his strength ebbed 
abruptly and the sounds of his torment sank to a low 
vibrating groan. Then even the groaning ceased. 

“Are you there, boy? The brandy, please.” 

There was a new sharp tone in the voice that made 
Kurt jump. It was as if some remnant of the doctor’s 
manhood had come back to him at last. He drained 
the flask to the bottom, and began speaking in short 
eager sentences. 

“Thanks. Now prop me up a bit. I want to write. 
There’s light enough yet.” 

He took a card from his pocket-book, scribbled a few 
lines on the back, and gave it to Kurt. 

“If I’m not conscious when help comes, you’re to 
hand this card to one of my friends. But it’s a private 
message. Promise you won’t read it? Good, then. 
That’s settled. . . . Now go over there and sit down 
a little way off. Turn your back too. The pain’s 
creeping up again, and I don’t want you to see me 
make a baby of myself. I’ll call you if I want any- 
thing, or if I ... 0 Christ, have mercy!” 

He fought back the agony, biting his lips until the 
blood dripped down into his beard. 

“No, I don’t need you,” he said, when he could speak 
again. “Please' do as I ask; please. It’s easier when 
you don’t look at me. And I’m not suffering so much 
now. Maybe the pain will die down soon ... die down 
. . . down . . . and give me a long rest.” 


56 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


Kurt was glad of any excuse for not watching the 
doctor’s face: even to hear the man scream made him 
feel ashamed, though he could not tell why. So he 
moved some ten feet away from his charge, turned his 
back, and gazed down into the valley, where far below 
him the village roofs still shimmered in the setting sun, 
while away to the left, half-way up the slope, the little 
gilded cross on the monk’s chapel at Castel’ di Monte 
gleamed faintly through a gap in the stunted trees. 

But higher up the mountain it was almost dark ; and 
from where Kurt sat, he could not have seen the doctor 
now, even if he had disobeyed and turned his head. 
Once or twice, in the shadows behind him, he heard 
Evers move slightly. Then came a long-drawn sigh. 

‘ 4 Does that mean that you ’re feeling better or worse ? ’ ’ 
asked Kurt over his shoulder. 

“0 better . . . ever so much better.” 

The voice spoke in short clipped phrases at constantly 
increasing intervals; it seemed to be growing weaker. 

“What’s your name, boy? . . . Kurt? . . . Well, 
Kurt, . . . you’re not a bad sort. . . . And you mustn’t 
blame yourself for anything. ... It hasn’t been your 
fault. . . . Don’t forget that.” 

“Hadn’t I better sit nearer you?” said Kurt, with a 
feeling of sudden uneasiness. 

“Don’t bother. It’s nothing but a passing faintness. 

. . . And yet ... I don’t know. . . . You can’t do any 

harm now . . . and it’s pitch dark too. . . . Don’t 

strike a light, but come here. ... No, not down there by 
my leg, . . . higher up by my head. That ’s right. . . . 
And . . . would you mind . . . catching hold of my 
hand? In case the pain gets bad again, you know. . . . 
Thanks. You are a good sort. . . . Feel inside my coat, 
will you? There’s a pocket-book on the right-hand side. 
Got it? . . . Then take what you want . . . and buy 

something to No. . . . No; don’t light a match. 

. . . Not yet. . . . And . . . and . . . don’t let go . . . 

my hand.” 

There was a long pause. Kurt felt the doctor’s fingers 
twitch nervously in his own firm grasp. 


The White Death and the Black 57 


‘ ‘ Are you still there, boy ? ’ ’ 

The voice that came from the darkness at Kurt’s side 
was so weak that he scarcely recognized it. 

“I’m feeling so much better ... no pain . . . not a 
bit of pain. . . . But, boy ... do you believe ... do 
you believe that when . . . when we die . . . anything 
happens . . . anything that makes . . . that makes any 
difference to a ” 

The voice trailed off into an inarticulate murmur, and 
then ceased altogether. 

The leaden silence lengthened and lengthened. Kurt’s 
ears began to hum, but he still sat motionless, holding 
in one hand the doctor’s unopened pocket-book, his re- 
laxed fingers in the other. A cold blast of wind swept 
along the mountain side; Kurt’s teeth chattered, and he 
longed for his warm jacket that was spread over the 
doctor’s wounded leg. 

“If you’re feeling so much better, perhaps I might 
take my coat,” he whispered, as if he feared to break 
the stillness. “I could cover you with one of the other 
wraps, and ... I’m cold.” 

Kurt waited for an answer until his ears commenced 
to buzz once more in the intolerable silence. Then he 
laid the doctor’s hand softly on the ground. The poor 
fellow must have fainted ; there would be no more 
groans now, for a time at least. Kurt was glad of 
that. 

And yet, only a moment afterwards, as he groped 
about searching for another wrap, the stillness made 
him so uneasy that he wished Evers might cry out 
again. Not a very loud scream ; but just a low moan. 

He soon found the wrap, and bent down over the doc- 
tor’s feet to pick up his own coat. A faint trickling 
reached his ears, probably the noise of some underground 
spring that was sending a tiny stream of water coursing 
among the dry rocks. Catching up his jacket, he swung 
it round, and thrust one arm into the sleeve. 

But the cloth clung stickily about his wrist; he shook 
his hand free of the sleeve again. The coat was soaking 
wet. 


58 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


Dew? ... Of course: dew. 

But . . . but . . . dew was cool and fresh: not so 

. . not so thick . . . not so warm, as the heavy moist- 
ure that he had felt beneath his fingers. 

He dropped his jacket and called to the doctor, gently 
at first ; then loudly, and louder still. 

He bent over the outstretched form. But he heard 
nothing except the thud-thud of his heart hammering 
against his ribs in the unbroken silence ; and he did not 
dare reach out his hand to touch what he knew was lying 
there in the dark at his feet. 

He was frightened now. But why ? 

He lost no time in searching for an answer. The only 
thing that he wanted was light. . . . Light. And that 
quickly. 

He picked up his jacket, remembering that he had 
left some matches in a side-pocket. Once more his 
fingers touched the damp cloth; even the inside of the 
pocket was wet. So was the wooden box. But the 
matches themselves were safe, and he rubbed one of them 
on the side of the box until the sulphur chanced on some 
dry spot and spluttered into flame. 

The match burned down to his fingers, scorched them, 
and went out. Kurt did not move. Even in the dark- 
ness that had closed in again he kept on gazing down 
at the match-box in his hand, as if he could still see 
this curious thing that a few hours before had been a 
common yellow square of dry brittle wood, but that was 
so different now, ... so soft, ... so wet, and . . . and 
stained such a bright, bright red. 

With an effort that brought the sweat to his forehead, 
he opened the box, and set a whole handful of matches 
ablaze. Then he forced himself to turn, ... to take a 
few steps forwards, . * . and to look down. 

The, open eyes were staring into space ; the mouth 
gaped wide in its frame of yellow beard; and from the 
crushed leg a red stream still moved slowly downwards, 
pushing its way in and out among the dry bare stones. 
Kurt bent lower, and lit match after match. 

Dead ! . . . And the fault all his. 


The White Death and the Black 59 


He had been careless in his watching; the tourniquet 
had slipped, and the doctor had bled to death, while he 
sat at his side holding his hand. How could it have 
happened ? Who would ever believe that such a happen- 
ing was possible? 

And the others ? When they came hurrying back with 
help and found their friend . . . like this . . . what 
then? They had warned him about the bandage, and 
now they would have a right to call him endless evil 
names. Of what use would his explanations be? The 
man was dead — and he — he had let him die. 

He could not face these people. Before they appeared 
he must find his way down to the village. He could 
hide in the hayloft till morning, and then beg Cigarette 
to leave the place at once, to escape southward into Italy, 
far, far away from these hated rocky peaks. 

But he did not know the mountain-paths ; in the dark- 
ness he was sure to walk blindly over some yawning 
precipice. 

He was helpless. And he was alone, so fear§omely 
alone. In his dread of the death-like silence, he began 
talking aloud with himself. 

“He warned me. ... He didn’t want me to come. 
. . . But I was afraid of that monk and his devils. And 
look at me now ! Devils are alive, anyway, but this doc- 
tor here . . . he . . . well, he isn ’t. He was kind to me, 
though . . . said that I wasn’t a bad sort, and died with 
his hand in mine. He offered me money too ... Oh! 
Lord, I’d forgotten that.” 

Here was a new terror. Kurt remembered now that, 
in the first moments of his fright, he had let fall the 
doctor ’s pocket-book. This he must find before he went ; 
he must put it back untouched inside the dead man’s 
coat. Otherwise people would say that he was a thief. 
Worse, perhaps. 

He had only one match left, so he dropped on hands 
and knees and felt along the ground in the dark. 

Nothing ! He could find nothing ! Suddenly his out- 
spread fingers touched a cold up-turned face, and he 
cried aloud. 


60 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


He must light his last match. There, almost under his 
hand, lay the doctor’s purse. Kurt seized it. Then, as 
he straightened up with the burning match still in his 
fingers, he saw — a face leap out from the shadows, and 
eyes that were watching him. 

He dropped the match. Had he seen a vision? Or 
was he going mad from sheer terror? 

‘ ‘ Cigarette, ’ ’ he whispered. “Is it thou, Cigarette?” 

Across the darkness shot a long ray of white light. 

The next moment Kurt had stumbled down the slope, 
and was clutching at Cigarette’s arm, gasping and sob- 
bing and laughing all at once. 

“Be quiet.” 

It was a tone that Cigarette seldom used, this sharp, 
harsh inflection of peremptory command, but it steadied 
Kurt’s nerves as nothing else could have done. 

“I have been seeking thee for nearly an hour, and 
might be seeking still, hadst thou not thought to light 
that last match. I was uneasy this morning, and so I 
have been following thy climbing-party all day long. 
On the way down the mountain I kept well ahead of 
you, and had begun to laugh at my fears when the guide 
came dashing past, calling out that there had been an 
accident. At his heels was a group of tourists; thou 
was ’t not among them, and I thought thee hurt. I made 
all haste, but this ridge concealed thee; night came on, 
and I missed the path. What has happened?” 

Kurt blurted out his story, holding Cigarette fast by 
the arm, and keeping him between himself and the spot 
where the doctor’s body lay. 

“Dost see that cluster of moving lights below us?” 
interrupted Cigarette. “The relief-party will be here 
within fifteen minutes, so thou and I had best be up and 
away. If they discover us, we shall be detained as 
witnesses, and stupid officials will ask me impertinent 
questions, which I have no desire to answer. Really, 
Kurt, I cannot compliment thee on this affair. Why 
didst thou let the poor fellow bleed to death ? ’ ’ 

Pushing the boy aside, he knelt down near the doctor’s 
body and let the light of his electric torch play over the 


The White Death and the Black 61 


crushed leg, and the pool of blood in which it rested. 

“Come nearer, Kurt,” he said abruptly. “I guessed 
that there was something here for thee to learn. Look 
there. ’ 9 

He had turned back the blood-soaked breeches and was 
pointing to a bluish mark on the flesh of the upper leg. 
Then, with the opened blade of a flat horn-handled knife 
that he had picked up from the ground, he searched 
through the crimson pool, until he fished out three sev- 
ered strands of coarse knotted cord. 

‘ ‘ He cut the bandage himself. The coward. ’ ’ 

Kurt resented the insult; he was seized by a strange 
impulse to defend this man who could no longer defend 
himself. 

“He couldn’t bear the pain,” he explained. “And 
even if he did unfasten the bandage, the fault was all 
mine. He wanted me to give him some medicine from a 
leather case, and I pretended that the bottle was lost. It 
might have saved his life.” 

“Not for long,” answered Cigarette, examining the 
glass tube that Kurt held out. “Hast thou anything 
else?” 

“The doctor’s pocket-book. He told me to take what 
money I wanted. But before I could open the purse — 
he didn ’t speak to me any more. ’ ’ 

Cigarette selected two hundred krone notes, and 
slipped the pocket-book back inside the doctor’s coat. 
For the first time that evening he smiled. 

“The last wishes of the departed must always be re- 
spected. Pick up thy jacket and come. The lights be- 
low are moving nearer.” 

“But he had another wish. He left me a note that I 
was to give his friends.” 

“Really, fright must have scattered all thy wits. 
Why didst thou not speak of this before ? ’ ’ 

Cigarette held the card under the light of his little 
lamp, and read the message aloud. 

“Pain intolerable. Am cutting the bandage. Don’t 
blame the boy; he doesn’t know what I’m doing, and 
he’s been good to me. . . . And thou, mother, thou must 


62 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

not grieve. Death is the end of everything. . . . But I 
wish thou wert here to hold my hand.” 

Cigarette took a gold pin from the doctor’s cravat and 
fastened the note on his breast. 

“I think somewhat better of him now,” he said. “So 
I’ll risk being found here to say one ‘Our Father’ for 
his soul’s repose. Take off thy hat.” 

With bared heads they stood in silence at the dead 
man’s side. Cigarette was the first to finish his brief 
devotions. 

“God send him rest,” he muttered, and turned im- 
patiently to his companion. “That’s enough, Kurt. In- 
stead of one ‘Our Father,’ thou’rt saying at least a 
score.” 

“I know it,” answered Kurt, as if he were stating a 
self-evident excuse for his long prayers. “But thou 
must remember that he didn’t believe in God.” 

‘ ‘ Quite possibly. . . . But he believes in Him now. ’ ’ 


Cigarette led the way along the steep incline. 

Soon the relief-party from Castel’ di Monte hurried 
past to join the other from the hotel ; but Cigarette and 
Kurt kept out of sight in the shadow of a rock, and then 
pushed on again until both clusters of converging lights 
were hidden by the jutting outline of the mountain. 

“Give me that glass tube,” said Cigarette stopping 
short. He turned the light of his lamp once more on 
the little phial that lay in the palm of his hand ; and a 
look came over his face that was strange to Kurt, 
strange and disquieting. 

“Twenty tabloids of a whole grain each. Enough to 

last a man for ” He shook his head impatiently 

and drew back his arm, as if to hurl the phial far down 
into the darkness. But his hand dropped slowly; he 
stood silent for a moment, and then put the glass tube 
carefully away in an inner pocket. The strange look 
faded from his face. 

“I’m not afraid of it any more,” he said. “At least, 


The White Death and the Black 63 

not much. . . . But there, there; thou dost not under- 
stand, thank God.” 

‘ ‘ May I not understand whither we are bound ? ’ ’ 

“We go to see the other side of the same picture. One 
man has imperilled his soul by taking refuge from pain 
in death, because he had too little religion. I hope to 
show thee now what may chance to men who have too 
much. ’ ’ 

They hurried along, running wherever the path per- 
mitted, and speaking only in short breathless sentences. 

“Before I followed thee this morning,” panted Ciga- 
rette, “I saw Menardi and told him that I might be 
late at our meeting-place. ... So late as this I had not 
thought to be — but I had no heart for the adventure, 
until I made sure of thy safety. ... If we miss Menardi, 
we 11 pay the Holy Man a visit on our own account. . . . 
Thou must face the devils — and witches — after all.” 

Now that Cigarette was with him, Kurt felt very 
brave, and he puffed back a valiant answer from between 
his half-closed lips. 

“After what I’ve been through to-day . . . nothing 
can frighten me any more.” 

“Don’t be too sure. Thou hast seen the White Death. 
That’s what the peasants call a death by accident on the 
mountains. And I trust that thou has looked him in the 
face to some profit. But, before long, we may have a 
sight of his Black Majesty; and he — well, he is far less 
pleasant to behold.” 

After an hour’s exhausting effort, climbing and run- 
ning in a zigzag course along the slope, they reached a 
level clearing where the path, by which they had come, 
was crossed by a broader track that led up from the 
village to the monk’s chapel at Castel’ di Monte. Here 
Cigarette and the soldier had planned to meet. But 
Menardi was nowhere to be found; and the two friends, 
supposing that he had grown tired of waiting and had 
gone home in disgust, pushed on up the mountain by 
themselves. 

Night had fallen long since ; the sky was covered with 


64 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


thick black clouds ; and a high wind from the north was 
already whistling down the valley, a forerunner of the 
predicted storm that was gathering fast. 

Castel’ di Monte was a small plateau on the spur of a 
lower range. Some centuries before, an old watch-tower 
had stood there, but nothing remained of it now except 
a few huge blocks of stone, strewn amidst the almost 
impenetrable underbrush. Partly from these ruins, 
partly from material supplied by his spiritual children, 
the pious monk had built a formless complex of low 
rooms, connected by rambling passage-ways and ending 
in a small chapel. Though such places are common 
enough in Tirol, this particular hermitage had an air of 
unusual seclusion, because the thick woods around it had 
never been cleared, and the well-worn path, that led to 
the chapel-porch, ended there abruptly, everything 
beyond being concealed by a screen of trees and 
heavy undergrowth. 

Up the mountain and along this path crept the two 
adventurers. As .they neared the hermitage and were 
gaining the level of the little plateau, Cigarette pulled 
Kurt aside into the deeper shadows of the woods; for 
light was streaming from the chapel-door, and in the 
porch stood two old women, who were speaking eagerly 
with a young girl, while behind them towered the tall 
dark figure of the monk. 

“But I’m afraid,” the girl was saying in a high, 
nervous tone. 4 ‘ I don ’t want to stay. Not to-night any- 
way. Not to-night. ’ ’ 

The monk answered inaudibly in a deep authoritative 
voice, raised his hand with a menacing gesture, and dis- 
appeared inside the lighted chapel. Then the two old 
women began to chatter, waving their arms about and 
interrupting each other so constantly, that only a few 
words here and there were borne towards the listeners 
by the rising wind. 

“Too late now.” . . . “ A very holy man. ” . . . “We 
went through it all ourselves.” ... “A frightful ex- 
perience, but afterwards, such peace.” . . . “Assured 
forgiveness of all sin and not more than a week of Purga- 


The White Death and the Black 65 


tory.” . . . “Our Lady promised him this in a vision/ ’ 

. . . “And remember, Marie, thou hast much to do pen- 
ance for.” . . . “That baby of thine.” . . . 

The girl, whose terrified eyes had been glancing hope- 
lessly from side to side, started suddenly forwards like 
a panic-stricken animal. But one of the women caught 
her deftly by the shoulders, twisted her about, and, push- 
ing her inside the chapel, closed the door upon her and 
fastened it with a heavy clanging staple. So neatly, so 
quickly was it all done, that Cigarette whispered to his 
companion — 

“This isn’t the first time that trick has been played 
here. . . . Keep back. Those old witches are coming. ’ ’ 

With a great brass lantern swinging between them, 
and each with a rosary running through her fingers, the 
two crones started down the path to the village, mum- 
bling prayers mixed with bits of gossip as they went. 

“Now and in the hour of our death, Amen. ... We 
have done a true act of charity for that poor girl’s soul. 
Didst thou say one baby, or two?” 

“World without end, Amen. . . . The good monk will 
be grateful to us for helping to silence her silly scruples. 
When we come again, we must ask him for some lottery- 
numbers. My sister won a tidy bit of money on a series 
that he gave her. But not more than a fifth of the sum 
would he accept. A holy man. . . . Our father, who 
art in heaven, hallowed ” 

The muttering voices died away; the swinging light 
disappeared, and Cigarette led Kurt back again into the 
path. They stole up into the porch of the chapel, and 
Cigarette unfastened the staple; but the door still held. 
The monk had evidently made haste to lock it from the 
inside, and it was far too strong to be forced. Moreover, 
the woods surrounding the hermitage grew so close 
against the side walls that only the projecting facade 
of the little chapel stood free, and this was unbroken 
by a single window through which they might hope to 
peer. 

The wind was still rising; great drops of rain had 
begun to fall ; the trees creaked and groaned. 


66 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


“We must work our way around the walls,” whispered 
Cigarette. “Didst thou recognize the girl who was 
forced into the chapel? It was Marie, our waitress at 
the inn.” 

Followed by Kurt he pushed slowly through the tan- 
gled brush, the circle of light from his electric lamp 
dancing over the rough walls. The noise of his passage 
through the crackling branches was drowned by the 
storm, and now and then a flash of lightning showed him 
the outline of the low roof; but nowhere could he find 
either window or opening of any description. 

Unexpectedly, at the back of the building, he came 
upon a narrow door. Here too was a break in the un- 
dergrowth, for straight onwards through the woods a 
path had been cut, ending at the door and hemmed in 
so closely on both sides by trees that any one leaving the 
hermitage must follow it whether he would or no. Yet 
the path showed little sign of use. And there was some- 
thing grim about it that frightened Kurt ; the shadows of 
stunted trunks and waving branches surrounded it like 
fierce Indian warriors drawn up in line, waiting with up- 
lifted clubs for some stumbling bleeding prisoner to run 
the gauntlet of their murderous weapons. 

Cigarette, who was examining the fastenings of the 
closed door, straightened up with a jerk. 

Above the storm rose a long-drawn cry of terror. It 
rang out so shrilly, it seemed so close, that he started 
back and dropped his lamp. 

Before he could find it again in the utter darkness, 
the screams ceased; the door was thrown open, and a 
long shaft of light lit up the path through the woods. 
Across the threshold darted a white figure. It tripped 
on a fold of its long shroudlike garment, and fell head- 
long. A bearded face bent over it, with quivering lips 
that moved rapidly iq entreaty and command. But the 
figure leaped to its feet again. 

“No . . . No . . . No,” it cried. 

Sobbing, and shielding its face with uplifted arm, it 
darted away down the narrow path. 

The monk shook his fist at the flying shape ; his sunken 


The White Death and the Black 67 


eyes gleamed, and he shouted down the roaring wind: 

“Go, wicked woman, stiff-necked and proud! Go to 
judgment with all thy sins wrapped about thee like fiery 
snakes of the Pit. Swift as the fall of Lucifer, so shall 
thy fall be. ” 

Then he crossed himself, clasped his hands, and mut- 
tered : 

4 4 But this is no time for anger. I must pray for a de- 
parting soul.” And falling on his knees, he began to 
repeat the Litany of the Dying. “Lord have mercy 
upon her. . . . Christ have mercy upon her. . . . Prom 
the gates of Hell deliver her soul, 0 Lord ” 

He knelt some little way down the path, facing the 
shadows into which the white figure had vanished, and 
hearing nothing except his own voice and the howling of 
the storm. Even when the door at his back was closed, 
he thought that the wind had blown it to, and prayed 
on in the dark without turning round. 

Cigarette and Kurt had shut the monk out of his own 
house. They had slipped past him as he knelt, and were 
now bolting the door behind them. 

4 4 Of course he can get in through the chapel-porch,” 
said Cigarette. 4 4 He must have the key. But hell 
finish his devotions first. And that ought to give us 
time enough.” 

Catching up a lamp, left burning in the passage, he 
ran down a corridor that ended in a small round room, 
where the air was heavy with steam and a choking odor 
of sulphur that rose from a sunken basin, hewn in the 
living rock of the floor and brimming with bubbling yel- 
lowish water. Kurt's head began to swim, and he hur- 
ried after Cigarette, who had crossed the room to the 
opening of another passage-way. 

At the end of this second corridor lay the monk’s cell. 
In one corner was a couch of straw; in another, a rusty 
iron stove. A shaded lamp burned on a wide table that 
was covered with books. Other volumes, for the most 
part in paper covers, lay scattered about in every direc- 
tion. Cigarette picked up one of these, glanced through 
it, and tossed it angrily on the floor. 


68 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


“But — but — what does this mean? I ought to know 
that coat-of-arms. ’ ’ 

He had been turning the pages of another volume, a 
rare edition of the “Imitatio Christi, ” that lay open 
beneath the lamp, and had come upon an elaborate book- 
plate on the inside of the vellum cover. 

His black eyes softened, and he stood motionless with 
the book in his hand, until Kurt, fearing the monk’s re- 
turn, touched his friend on the shoulder. 

Instantly Cigarette was all energy again. Dropping 
the book, he hastened back into the room of the sulphur- 
spring, where he soon discovered a third and last passage 
that led into a small apse behind the altar of the chapel. 
This semicircular space apparently served the monk as a 
sacristy; but it must have other mysterious uses also, 
for along the wall were ranged six rough wooden coffins, 
all closed, while another one of stone rested on supports 
in the center of the room, open, as if awaiting its tenant. 
Beside it stood a chair; and on the floor were scattered 
a woman’s clothes. 

Cigarette stooped down over one of the wooden coffins 
and began to tug at the loosely fastened lid. 

But Kurt, dreading the thing that must lie beneath 
the cracking worm-eaten cover, covered his eyes, and 
waited impatiently for some cry of horror from his 
friend’s lips. Yet no cry came. Though he strained his 
ears to listen, he heard nothing except the roar of the 
storm and the ‘ ‘ whish-whish-whish-h-h ” of the branches 
as they beat against the walls outside. Finally, he mus- 
tered up enough courage to peek through his fingers. 

There was nothing terrible to be seen ; nothing at all, 
except Cigarette, who stood at Kurt ’s elbow, holding out 
a silk kerchief such as peasant women wear about their 
necks. Age had dimmed the gay colors; the stuff itself 
was damp with mold. 

‘ ‘ The coffins are all empty, ’ ’ said Cigarette. ‘ ‘ That is, 
there’s nothing inside them except clothes like this. I 
can’t understand what it means, and why ” 

He stopped short. In a momentary breathless hush of 
the storm he had caught the harsh grating sound of a key 


The White Death and the Black 69 


hastily turned in a lock, the lock of the chapel door. 
Then came the rattle of a heavy panel sent crashing back 
against the wall, and the noise of footsteps that stamped 
and stumbled along the aisle towards the altar. 

Thrusting Kurt behind him, Cigarette stood in the 
opening of the passage that led out of the apse, blocking 
the way to other parts of the house. Almost at the same 
moment, around the corner of the altar came the monk. 
His face was scratched; the ends of snapped twigs were 
caught in his tangled beard ; his panting lips hung wide 
open, and his eyes were big with instant fear. He did 
not seem to notice the two intruders, but glanced back 
over his shoulder towards the door, faced about, and 
peered down into the chapel, listening. 

Beyond the apse in the darkened aisle there was silence 
for an instant. Then other footsteps echoed under the 
porch and passed through the chapel, drawing nearer 
and nearer to the altar, behind which the monk was 
cowering. 

“I can’t go a step further,” said a high-pitched trem- 
bling voice, and the footsteps ceased. ‘ ‘ Let me rest here 
on this bench. — But you must promise to come back.” 

“Surely. Only first I must rout the devil out of his 
nest. ’ ’ 

Kurt knew that subdued booming tone. So did the 
monk; and he seemed to recognize the other voice too, 
for he turned to flee down the passage-way towards the 
safety of his inner rooms. 

And thus he came face to face with Cigarette. 

Heavy boots stamped up through the little sanctuary, 
and a figure in a gray uniform strode around the corner 
of the altar. Yet the monk stood motionless, gazing at 
Cigarette, and mumbling in his long beard as he shaded 
his eyes with both hands. Behind him, Menardi had 
gathered his strength, and was about to spring forward 
at his defenseless enemy. 

“Hands off him!” 

Cigarette’s voice rang out so sharply that Menardi 
stumbled back against the altar in surprise. Then, see- 
ing who had spoken, he came forward again. 


70 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

“Oh, it’s you, comrade, is it? Better let me at him. 

You don’t know what wickedness he’s been up to.” 

“Hands off, I say. And guard this passage until I 
come back.” 

The soldier obeyed mechanically ; and Cigarette, catch- 
ing up the woman’s clothes that lay strewn about the 
floor, ran down into the dark aisle, where he had an indis- 
tinct glimpse of a white shape crouching on one of the 
benches, and tossed the clothes at its feet. When he re- 
turned to the little room behind the altar, he found that 
the monk had not stirred ; his eyes were rolling, his whole 
body quivered, and he followed Cigarette’s goings and 
comings with a stare of pitiful childish terror. 

From one of the wooden coffins Cigarette drew the 
moldy kerchief of faded silk, and brought it to the puz- 
zled soldier. 

‘ ‘ Do you recognize it ? ” 

Menardi shook his head. Cigarette plunged his hand 
into the next coffin, and the first thing that his fingers 
touched was the embroidered waist of a woman’s gown. 
The cloth was sound, the colors still bright. He held it 
out to the soldier, who began to examine it with stupid 
indifference. 

A sudden rush of blood crimsoned the man’s face and 
neck. With a furious jerk he unsheathed his short sword 
and darted at the silent monk. The hermit did not 
flinch; indeed he was not looking at the soldier at all: 
his eyes were still fastened upon Cigarette, whose hand 
shot out over his shoulder and caught Menardi by the 
wrist, so that the gleaming side-arm fell jingling to the 
floor. 

“But she wore it on our wedding-day,” panted 
Menardi. “And, after that, on Sundays and big festi- 
vals. Don’t you understand? Her clothes — my wife’s 
clothes — are here; but her bones lie with the others at 
the foot of the rocks.” 

“I have no wish to cross your vengeance,” answered 
Cigarette, handing back the fallen sword. “But let me 
warn you. Even if you can prove this man a murderer, 
your own people will never believe that you acted justly 


The White Death and the Black 71 


in slaying him. Bad or good, a monk is a monk, and 
with his blood on your hands you could never show your 
face in the valley again, especially among the women. 
And some of them are not such unpleasant companions 
for a soldier.” 

He whispered to Menardi, who went down into the 
chapel, and soon came back with a white-faced disheveled 
girl leaning heavily on his arm. She had done what she 
could to dress herself in the dark, but Cigarette had for- 
gotten to bring her shoes, and her torn feet left red stains 
on the rough stone floor. 

‘ ‘ Follow me, . . . Brother Melchoir, ’ ’ said Cigarette. 

The monk’s hands flew to his throat, as if he were 
choking. But he obeyed, and the strange little proces- 
sion passed down the corridor, through the round room 
with its bubbling hot spring, and so by the second passage 
into the monk’s bare cell. Cigarette sat down on the 
further side of the book-strewn table, where the shaded 
lamp still burned ; Kurt leaned in nervous silence against 
the back of his friend ’s chair ; and before them stood the 
monk with downcast eyes ; while Menardi, although with- 
drawn some little distance from his enemy, still threat- 
ened him with outstretched fist, devoting the strength of 
his other arm to support the frightened girl, who hid her 
face against the gray cloth of his uniform jacket. 

“This matter,” began Cigarette, “concerns the honor 
of a place once dear to me. Therefore, I am pleased to 
act as judge.” 

No one questioned this assumption of authority, but 
accepted it as the most natural thing in the world. So 
Cigarette nodded first to Menardi, and the soldier began 
to speak in his deep resonant bass, interrupting his story 
now and then to comfort Marie, or to listen to the wind 
that was shrieking shrilly around the lonely house, snap- 
ping short the smaller branches of the trees outside in 
intermittent volleys of sharp cracking sounds. 

“I don’t know how I ever screwed up enough pluck 
to come here alone. But I was so angry with you for 
not meeting me as you’d promised that perhaps I forgot 
to be afraid. It was still light when I got to the chapel, 


72 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

and I heard women’s voices praying inside, so I sneaked 
around the side walls. Just as you two did, I suppose. 
After a while I came across that door at the back, and 
the path cut through the underbrush. What made me 
walk along that path I can’t imagine. But I hadn t gone 
fifty meters before I thought I heard some one whisper- 
ing my name. Perhaps it was only the rustling of the 
trees. Anyway, it sounded to me like my wife’s voice, 
and I stopped short to look ahead. — That was what saved 
me. For only a little farther on the path took a sudden 
unexpected dip, and I saw that it went straight down 
into a narrow crevice of the mountain. If I hadn’t been 
on the watch, or if it had been dark, by now I’d be lying 
among the rocks, deep deep down out of sight, smashed 
and dead. — And that’s where this devil wanted to send 
poor Marie. Think what might have happened to her. 
Think of it.” 

The girl put her hand gently over Menardi’s mouth, 
who seemed to have quite forgotten that his own wife 
had gone to her death by that same road. 

“But I prayed for their souls,” interposed the monk. 

Cigarette turned to Marie. She held her protector 
tightly by the belt and threw one arm across her eyes. 

“Must I tell? It makes my heart jump so. — Well, 
then — I’ll — I’ll try. He — he — ” (from under her arm 
she glanced at the monk and shuddered) — “he frightened 
me. — All alone with him up here. — And that storm roar- 
ing outside. It was terrible. — We prayed a lot together, 
and he told me of all the torments that I ’d have to suffer 

in Purgatory because I once had — because I once let 

Oh, I can’t say it. He made me take off my clothes, put 
on a white shroud, and then bend over that hot hole in 
the rock to feel how boiling the water was. It came up 
straight from Hell, he said ; and if I didn ’t do as he bade 
me I shouldn’t even get into Purgatory, but would just 
roast in devil-water a million times hotter than this for 
ever and ever. — The smell from the bubbly hole made 
me dizzy, and I suppose that I must have fainted. When 
I came to my senses again I was lying in that uncovered 
stone coffin. It was so cold there and so dark that I 


The White Death and the Black 73 


thought I was really dead. But then he — he came and 
sat down on a chair at my side. I must lie where I was 
all night, he whispered; and in the morning he’d come 
again, hear my confession, and give me absolution. If I 
didn ’t move, but prayed hard till daylight, I ’d be sure to 
keep out of Hell and wouldn’t have but a little bit of 
Purgatory. — He started to leave me, and I — I jumped 
out of the coffin. I simply couldn’t lie there alone. He 
tried to stop me. I screamed, and ran off just as I was. 
Then he got very angry, and let me out of a door. I 
couldn’t see or hear or think, I was so frightened. All 
I wanted was to find some place where there were lights 
and people. And away I went through the woods like a 
wild thing. I thought I was on the path to the village, 
when all of a sudden some one with a light jumped out 
of the bushes and caught me round the waist.” 

“I stopped her just in time,” Menardi explained. 
“She fought and scratched at first, but after I’d ex- 
plained a bit she came back with me along the path. 
That old Satan was still praying outside the closed door, 
and when he saw Marie in the flare of my torch he 
thought she was a ghost. He jumped up, found the door 
behind him locked, and dashed off through the under- 
brush along the side walls. We followed him.” 

“I did it all for their good,” interrupted the monk 
again, lifting his eyes to Cigarette’s face. “They were 
not truly penitent. Because of their wilfulness they lay 
under God’s wrath, and I hoped that a painful death on 
the rocks might make Him sorry for them. It was their 
only chance. I couldn’t recover their bodies, so I kept 
their clothes — each one’s clothes in her own separate 
coffin — and I said a 'Requiem’ for each woman’s soul 
with her coffin set up in front of the altar. It was almost 
like a regular funeral. And it was the best that I 
could do. ’ ’ 

Cigarette beckoned the girl to come closer, and whis- 
pered a short question. She shook her head indignantly. 

“Thank God for that,” he said, and turned to the 
soldier, who had drawn Marie close within his protecting 
arm once more. “Your wife is dead, comrade. But 


74 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

through her your honor has suffered no stain. It is now 
for you to consider whether you may not tarnish it your- 
self by taking the life of this old man.” 

Then, leaning forward across the table, Cigarette began 
speaking to the monk slowly and distinctly as one speaks 
with a stupid disobedient child. 

“Look at me, Brother Melchior. Dost thou not know 
my face?” 

“Not the face, but the eyes. Yea, I knew and trem- 
bled, for I thought you a ghost, even as this woman here. 

The old man’s knees gave way, and he groveled on the 
floor at Cigarette’s feet. 

“Forgive, forgive, Altezza,” he pleaded. “It was 
wrong, I know. But let the Signor Duca listen, and then 
judge. They were plotting to send me from the monas- 
tery. The new Prior was ever my enemy, and I heard 
him say to another that I was not right in my head, that 
I must be confined somewhere lest I bring scandal on the 
Order. He would have thrown me into a lonely place of 
torment — he would have taken the habit from me — the 
blessed habit of our founder — mine since boyhood, Al- 
tezza. He would have cast me out — me who had no other 
home — me the oldest of all the lay-brothers. So in my 
great fear I fled secretly into the world, taking nothing 
save the compass and comfort of my soul, a single volume, 
‘The Imitation of Christ.’ For months I journeyed, 
until I found a refuge here. The people were friendly ; 
they came to me in many troubles, and my heart yearned 
over them, for I was of their kind ; I always understood ; 
often I could help. — One day, in a house at the village, I 
found by chance a — a — romance, left there by some pass- 
ing tourist. I had never seen such a book before; it 
opened a whole new world to me, and I soon longed for 
others. But they cost money. And I had only one 
means of securing it. — I let the people believe that I was 
a priest — they built me this chapel, and I — I began, little 
by little, to say Mass for them, accepting such small offer- 
ings as they made. Ah, that was my great sin ! But the 
hooks — the hooks! The money that I took for Masses 
all went to a man in a distant town, who sent me new 


The White Death and the Black 75 


volumes from time to time. — So years, many years, went 
by. Oh ! I have passed through many grievous tempta- 
tions : body to body have I wrestled with Satan, praying 
that God’s finger might touch me and dry up the fleshly 
desires that warred against my soul. But although the 
adversary sometimes prevailed against me, I cheated him 
always of his victory by taking refuge in my evil books. — 
Visions celestial also have been granted me ; the very dust 
of this floor has been swept by the blue hem of Our 
Lady’s mantle. But my crosses too were many. The 
women-folk in the valley grieved me with their sins. I 
dreaded hearing their confessions, since the matters of 
which they spoke poisoned my thoughts and gave occa- 
sion to many assaults of the enemy. I longed to make 
them more virtuous. And when I discovered the hot 
spring with its strange fumes, I welcomed it as sent by 
heaven. Fright was a wholesome medicine, I knew, al- 
though in administering it I grieve to think that I often 
found a curious pleasure ; and many women were helped 
indeed. But one night, some years ago, a proud girl re- 
fused to obey me; she ran away through the woods, and 
by accident found death in the hidden cleft of the moun- 
tain. Her fate seemed like a just decree of the Almighty. 
So in secret I built that back door and cleared the path, 
seeking, however humbly, to assist His righteous judg- 
ments. — Thus it all was, Altezza. Thus and no other- 
wise. ’ ’ 

Cigarette sighed as he gazed at the groveling figure 
before him. 

“A strong faith and a weak head make a dangerous 
combination,” he murmured; and then continued in the 
same low voice as if weighing both sides of the case, 

1 ‘ what shall I do? Unless these iniquities are proven in 
open court, the superstitious crones in the valley will con- 
tinue to persuade every thoughtless girl that she can 
only escape hell-fire by spending a night with this holy 
hermit, who will either frighten her half to death, or, if 
she rebels, will send her down that path to the precipice 
and kill her outright. Yet, if I deliver the man to human 
justice, there will be an endless scandal of lies and dirt. 


76 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

Why should I put into the hands of Jews and unbelievers 
a weapon against the religion that I love ? No, not that, 
at any cost. For old times’ sake, there must be no clue 
to lead some leering detective from Castel’ di Monte back 
to one of the few places which the evil morbid curiosity 
of our age has no right to enter. ” 

He looked down again at the prostrate monk, and raised 

his voice. . 

‘ ‘ Brother Melchior, for the honor of our ancient house, 
help me to deal justly. What is thine own wish in this 
matter ? Thy fondest desire ? ” 

‘ ‘ To be dissolved, ’ ’ muttered the bearded lips ; “to be 
dissolved and to be with Christ.” 

“The second half of thy wish is beyond my power to 
grant. But the first ” 

The monk interrupted him, rising quickly to his feet 
and holding out his clasped hands. 

“Have pity, Altezza,” he cried, his sunken eyes glow- 
ing with the intensity of his desire. “Surely you have 
still the right of the High Justice, the Middle, and the 
Low. Long since, had it not been forbidden me, I should 
have followed my unhappy people over the precipice. 
Year in, year out, I have prayed for death. And yet its 
coming tarries. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ Go back to the chapel, brother, and fetch me a chalice. 
Also the ‘ciborium’ from the altar. 

The monk hastened away and returned almost immedi- 
ately, bearing an empty chalice in one hand, and in the 
other the cup-shaped vessel, or ‘ ‘ ciborium, ’ ’ in which are 
kept the consecrated Hosts reserved for the communion 
of the laity. He set the two vessels before Cigarette. 

The ciborium was covered with a short silk veil, in 
token that it enshrined the Present Christ and was filled 
with the Bread of Life. But Cigarette, with unanointed 
hands, removed this veil, lifted off the round metal cover, 
and tossed out upon the table a pile of small white discs. 

Marie screamed, and, covering her eyes, fell on her 
knees. Kurt knelt too. The soldier beat his breast, and 
crossed himself automatically over and over again. 


The White Death and the Black 77 


Cigarette struck the table angrily with his fist. 

“But the man is no priest,” he said. “He has no 
more power than I to consecrate a Host. These things 
here are nothing but bits of unleavened bread. ’ ’ 

Nevertheless Marie would not rise; she was too thor- 
oughly terrified by the apparent sacrilege; and Kurt, 
though he forced himself to stand up, felt his knees trem- 
ble beneath him; while Menardi crossed himself once or 
twice more and sweated profusely. 

“Brother Melchior,” began Cigarette, “in so far as I 
may, I am about to grant thee thy heart’s desire. In 
the presence of these witnesses thou shalt lie down in the 
open stone coffin behind the altar of the chapel. There 
thou shalt choose one of these holy vessels and drink what 
it contains; for with them thou hast sinned in thy false 
masses, and therefore they shall be thy judges. Then we 
shall leave thee ; thou shalt compose thyself to sleep, and 
God the All-Merciful shall decide whether thou art to 
wake in this world or in the next.” 

The monk caught Cigarette’s hand and kissed it pas- 
sionately. 

Near the lamp stood a bottle of the weak native wine. 
Cigarette drew this towards him, stepped in front of the 
table, and turned his back, thus hiding from the others 
both chalice and ciborium. Brother Melchior fell face 
downwards on the floor, and began to pray aloud; both 
Marie and the soldier were still held spellbound by the 
sight of that scattered handful of white Hosts; but 
Kurt’s eyes never left the figure that was bending over 
the table so mysteriously. 

He saw Cigarette’s elbow move, as if his hand were 
drawing something from an inner pocket: then came a 
succession of soft little plashing sounds. Kurt counted 
them, from one to ten. 

A long pause followed. Brother Melchior had ceased 
praying, and the room was deathly still. 

At last the same plashing sounds began again. And 
once more Kurt counted from one to ten. Then Cigar- 
ette faced about, and, touching Menardi on the shoulder, 


78 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

pointed to the two vessels standing side by side, each 
half-filled with the white wine. 

“ Comrade, this old man owes you a debt, but he is 
willing to pay it, if need be, with his life. As for your- 
self, you came here to find a wife, and perhaps your 
search may prove successful after all. So your score is 
settled, and if you are satisfied with my reckoning, we 
need not keep Brother Melchior waiting any longer. ’ ’ 

Menardi nodded carelessly ; he seemed to have lost all 
interest in everything except Marie, who had at last risen 
from her knees, and was blushing a healthy crimson under 
his unbridled looks of admiration. But, when Cigarette 
pointed towards the chapel, her cheeks went white again, 
and she seized Menardi by the belt with a firm hand. 

‘ ‘ Don ’t let them take me near that coffin again. ’ ’ 

“If you had rather wait here,” suggested Cigarette, 
beginning to lose patience, “the sergeant will doubtless 
keep you company.” 

Menardi smiled down into the girl’s face; she smiled 
back, and let go of his belt. Then, as Cigarette turned 
to leave the room, angered by their selfishness, Marie 
called after him with a sudden gasp of superstitious fear. 

“Oh, please — please — I won’t be able to talk comfort- 
ably with Toni, unless you — put away those — those 
things on the table. ’ ’ 

Cigarette swept the pile of white Hosts into his pocket, 
gave Kurt a lantern, and took the two vessels in his own 
hands. He spoke softly to Brother Melchior. 

“I am ready, Altezza,” answered the monk, stepping 
forward to lead the way, his hands crossed upon his 
breast. 

When they reached the dim apse, Brother Melchior 
lighted two long tapers on the altar. 

“From where I lie in the coffin,” he explained, “I 
shall be able to see those two tips of flame. Many a long 
night through have I watched them, for in times of 
temptation I often made my bed here, so that I might the 
better meditate upon death. And now, death is near at 
last, please God.” 

He slipped out of his tattered brown habit; rolled it 


The White Death and the Black 79 


together for a pillow ; and, his great eyes burning in an 
ecstasy of expectation, he laid himself down, a dark mass 
of knobby bones and clay-colored flesh framed in by the 
shimmering stone sides of the coffin. As Cigarette came 
towards him, he raised himself on one elbow, and held out 
his hand with the eager gesture of a little child. 

“I hope I choose rightly,” he said. “Oh, I do hope 
that. ’ ’ 

He glanced from one vessel to the other, hesitating, 
distressed. Then he crossed himself; muttered a short 
prayer ; and, seizing the ciborium, drained it to the dregs. 

Another sign of the cross; and he repeated the old 
Latin Grace-after-Meat — 

“We give Thee thanks, Almighty God, for all Thy 
benefits, Who livest and reignest, One God, world with- 
out end, Amen. ’ ’ 

His “Thanksgiving” ended, he lay back and closed his 
shining eyes, clasping a well-worn rosary in his blue- 
veined swollen hands. 

“Did he get the poison?” whispered Kurt, as Cigarette 
set the two vessels down on a chair. 

Cigarette made no answer; he only drew Kurt closer 
to the side of the coffin. 

Slowly the seconds lengthened out into minutes. Then 
the bearded lips parted again in a low murmur. 

4 ‘ I kiss your hands, Altezza, ... I kiss your gracious 
hands ten thousand thousand times. . . . Already I am 
released from the body. . . . My soul is flying . . . flying 
far off . . . floating down the wind. ... I am so light 
... so light. And . . . around me is ... a great 
quietness . . . everywhere . . . everywhere.” 

Kurt caught his friend by the arm and dragged him 
away. 

“I can’t bear to see another man die. So it was the 
poison, then?” 

Cigarette nodded, and turned for a last look at Brother 
Melchior. 

“Stop . . . Stop! . . . Put that down, for God’s 
sake ! ” 

His voice rose to a sudden scream. Snatching the un- 


80 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

touched chalice from Kurt’s hand, he poured its contents 
out on the floor. 

“But there was nothing in it except wine,” protested 
the boy. “And I was so thirsty.” 

A strange grayish shadow hovered about Cigarette’s 
mouth, and his hands were, trembling. With one arm 
clasped tightly around Kurt’s shoulders, he walked in 
silence down the corridor, back to the monk’s cell, where 
he found Marie and Toni Menardi sitting very close to- 
gether in a dark corner. The girl started up. 

“Is he ... Is he f” 

She read her answer in Cigarette’s eyes, and, drawing 
away from the soldier, began to whisper a prayer for her 
tormentor’s soul. 

“He got off mighty easy,” said Menardi with rough 
bravado. His lust for vengeance had passed long since ; 
now his fears were passing too. “When he’s found dead 
in that coffin, his reputation as a holy man’ll be bigger 
than ever, and all the women in the valley’ll come on a 
pilgrimage to his grave. ’ ’ 

“All except one,” suggested Marie, making a hasty 
end of her devotions. 

“Perhaps that particular One won’t be living in the 
valley at all. You never can tell. And before I go back 
to the regiment, I want to . . .” 

“Here’s Brother Melchior’s lantern,” interrupted 
Cigarette, annoyed beyond further endurance by Me- 
nardi ’s loud jarring tone. “The worst of the storm is 
over, and you ought to have no trouble in showing Marie 
the path down the mountain. On the way, you’ll have 
plenty of time to discuss the important business of finding 
a mother for your little son. Take my blessing, both of 
you, and hurry home. The chapel door is unlocked. ’ ’ 

The soldier scratched his head, pursing up his lips in 
an expression of doubt. 

“It isn’t because I’m afraid,” he stammered. “But 
. . . just the same I . . . I . . . think we ’ll leave by the 
back door. I’d rather crawl round through the under- 
brush than pass that stone coffin behind the altar. On 
Marie’s account, of course.” 


The White Death and the Black 81 


Cigarette saw the couple safely on their way. When 
he had heard them break through the bushes and come 
out safely in front of the chapel, he shot the heavy bolts 
of the back door, and, returning with Kurt to the monk ’s 
cell once more, he tossed the scattered books into an old 
blanket and swung the bundle up on his shoulder. He 
was now all haste to be gone. 

Kurt, however, had even less desire than the soldier to 
pass the open stone coffin ; but, as there was no avoiding 
it, he kept his eyes tightly shut while walking through 
the space behind the altar, and clung to his companion’s 
arm until they had stumbled down the dark aisle and 
stood at last in the open air beneath the little porch of 
the chapel, with the path to the valley stretching out at 
their feet. 

Without his lamp, Cigarette did not dare hurry down 
the mountain, although both wind and rain had ceased. 
In the woods, not far below the hermitage, he found a 
fairly dry resting-place for Kurt; and, while the boy 
slept, sat at his side, waiting for the dawn. 

When the sun had risen over the valley in a glory of 
golden clouds, he sought patiently for some half-dry 
sticks and succeeded at last in starting a fire. 

‘ ‘ And hast thou really something to cook ? ’ ’ demanded 
Kurt with a hungry yawn. 

‘ ‘Indeed I have. Only it isn’t our breakfast. It’s the 
devil’s.” 

Cigarette opened the bundle of books taken from the 
monk’s cell, tore out the pages in handfuls, and began 
feeding them to the flames. But they did not burn 
easily, for the paper was coarse and damp. Kurt picked 
up a partially charred leaf. 

“Kindly consider the beauty of the sunrise,” said 
Cigarette, snatching the torn page away and thrusting it 
deep into the fire. 

But Kurt had caught sight of the picture on the burn- 
ing paper ; he flushed crimson, and turned his back, while 
Cigarette worked on diligently until there was nothing 
left of Brother Melchior’s library except a pile of grayish 
ashes and a single volume, bound in vellum with an en- 


82 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

graved “ex libris” on the inside of the cover. This book 
Cigarette slipped into his pocket ; it would have been an 
intolerable sacrilege to burn it on the same pyre with 
those others. 

The mountain side was all agleam in the full light of 
the morning as the two friends started down towards the 
valley. 

“Let us hear the sum of the whole matter,” said Ciga- 
rette. “For an average man, the safest going is in the 
middle of the road. Too much religion is as bad as too 
little. Thou thyself has seen how each extreme has cost 
a man’s life. And this night’s happenings should teach 
thee more about the Golden Mean than the whole Nico- 
machean Ethics of Aristotle.” 

When Cigarette talked like this, Kurt felt that he did 
not love him as much as usual. 

“I don’t understand thy long words; nor thy foolish 
behavior last night when I wanted to drink from that 
chalice. ’ ’ 

“It was full of morphia.” 

‘ ‘ But I thought that Brother Melchior chose the — the — 
poison. ’ ’ 

“So he did.” 

“Then I don’t take thy meaning.” 

‘ ‘ I had not intended telling thee. . . . But the matter 
is simple enough. . . . When I was arranging the two 
vessels, I suddenly lost my faith in the ways of Provi- 
dence. I have not always found them either just or re- 
liable. So I divided the twenty tabloids equally between 
the two cups.” 

‘ ‘ He had no choice at all, then ? ’ ’ 

“None. Chance or Providence, call it as thou wilt, is 
cruel oftentimes, and might have denied him peace. But 
I was pitiful. As an absolute Lord of Life and Death, I 
was pleased to grant him his heart ’s desire. ’ ’ 

“And Chance came near taking a neat revenge by 
giving me the last thing that I wanted. ’ ’ 

“I am rebuked. Not a Lord of Life and Death then, 
but the slave of both.” 

Among the bare rocks, a flock of birds were searching 


The White Death and the Black 83 


for food on a narrow stretch of green grass. Cigarette 
watched them as they fluttered about, and, hoping to 
find some crumbs for their breakfast, he felt through all 
his pockets and drew out a handful of the round white 
Hosts from the altar of Castel’' di Monte. Kurt shrank 
back, dropping his friend’s arm with a subdued cry of 
protest. 

“Too much religion still?” said Cigarette. “And 
after such a lesson, too ? ’ ’ 

He crumbled the unleavened bread between his fingers 
and scattered it on the grass. One by one the little flock 
came hopping towards the white morsels and began pick- 
ing at them ravenously with shrill pipings of delight. 

Cigarette’s face lit up with one of his rare smiles. 

“They were starving. Sometimes I think that this 
world of ours is not so merciless after all. Even the 
evil in it often makes for good. Without the sin of 
Brother Melchior these birds must have gone hungry. ’ ’ 

4 ‘ But I ’m hungry, too. ’ ’ 

“Oh, gross materialist ! And yet, I admit that an all- 
night struggle with evil does give one an appetite for 
righteousness in the morning. So why not an appetite 
for breakfast? Come along, then; take my arm again, 
and let’s hurry down to the valley. Our good farmer 
shall give us food for the inner man. And after that we 
can go to sleep in his hospitable hay.” 


ADVENTURE THIRD 


THE RETURN HOME, AND THE STORY OF THE KIN^ 
SON AND HIS GOOD DEED 

Kurt sat down by the roadside, almost within sig i 
the old ‘ ‘ Rath-Haus ’ ’ roof, that rose above the villag 
square and the moss-grown well, where he and C tu 
had stood face to face for the first time more thai ear 
ago. 

He was untying the knotted strings of a b' 
same bundle that had been entrusted to a goou lured 
farmer when Kurt set out on his “ Wander- Jahr,’ and 
that had lain safe all these months in some corner of the 
peasant’s garret. The black broadcloth clothes, the pur- 
ple cravat, the reversible celluloid cuffs, and all the other 
odds and ends of finery which Cigarette had once sepa- 
rated from the absolute necessities of Kurt’s outfit, were 
now unpacked and laid out on the grass. Kurt turned 
them over; it seemed countless ages since they had last 
passed beneath his hands. Were these indeed the things 
that he had treasured so highly — all this useless stuff? 
The cuff-buttons with the red Tyrolese eagles were 
wrapped in a page torn from an old “Nick Carter” story. 
Kurt glanced at a few sentences. And had such trash 
as this really interested him once? It didn’t seem pos- 
sible. He was conscious of a sense of shame. What a 
fool he had been in those days ! 

Kurt had wriggled into the celluloid cuffs and the 
creased black coat ; but he cut such a sorry figure in these 
outgrown glories that Cigarette burst out laughing. 

“Why, I can’t breathe in the things,” cried Kurt. 
He expanded his chest, and the upper buttons of the coat 
flew off into the grass. 

“Thou art bigger in mind as well as in body,” Ciga- 


The Return Home 


85 


rette replied, and the far-away look of sadness, that had 
so seldom touched his face in the last months, stole into 
his eyes again, like the unclean wandering spirit return- 
ing to its swept and garnished house. ‘ ‘ But it isn ’t only 
thy coat that will seem too small. Life among thine own 
people may prove narrow for thee too. That is the Curse 
of the Road.” 

Kurt threw the coat aside. He had been quick to no- 
tice the unhappy shimmer in Cigarette’s eyes, and, sit- 
ting down beside his friend, he took the older man ’s hand 
in his own. 

“What troubles thee at a time like this?” he asked. 
‘ ‘ Are we not coming home ? ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ To thy home, yes. But ’ 7 

“It’s all the same. Thy people are my people; my 
home is thy home too.” 

“I wish it were. But I have no abiding-place any- 
where. Or at least, I have not found it yet. So I must 
seek it farther on. How much farther, God only knows. 
Not very far, I hope, for I’m getting old and tired. And 
sometimes I lose ” 

He hesitated, and pushed back the hair from his fore- 
head with the old familiar gesture that always betrayed 
his most desperate efforts to look his life bravely in the 
face. But Kurt rebelled. Throwing himself down flat 
on the grass, he covered his eyes with both arms, and 
began to kick up great clods of the soft earth with his 
toes. Cigarette bent over him. 

“No! Not another step,” he muttered between his 
clenched teeth. “I won’t walk another step. I’ll turn 
right round this minute, and run back to Naples, and 
. . . and be killed by the Camorra. Yes, I will, unless 
. . . unless thou wilt promise not to go away. . . . What 
was the use of taking me with thee ? . . . Why hast thou 
let me get so ... so used to our being together. It 
wasn’t fair. . . . Thou must not leave me now. It would 
be like asking me to go on living without a — without 


“Without a stomach,” suggested Cigarette. 

“That’s it. I couldn’t live without a stomach, could 


86 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

I? Now thou see’st what I mean. So promise! . . . 
Promise !” 

“What was the good of our long months together? 
repeated Cigarette slowly. “Ah, that I can’t tell! My 
whole life has been spent in doing things about which I 
must always ask that same useless unanswerable question. 
But this much I can promise thee.^ We shall not sepa- 
rate until I am able to go farther afield with thy full and 
free consent.” 

Kurt sprang up. 

‘ ‘ That will be never, ’ ’ he laughed. 

Cigarette knew better, but he forebore to answer. He 
realized that the day would soon come when Kurt ’s whole 
life would center about the face of some smiling girl. 
And it was right that it should be so. He would not 
have wished it otherwise. But yet . . . yet. . . . For all 
its beauties of city and vale and plain, for all its glories 
of youth and friendship and desire, how wretchedly im- 
perfect the whole world often seemed ! 

His thoughts were cut short by Kurt’s eagerness to be 
gone. They strapped up their knapsacks and started off 
down the road, side by side, for the last time. 

“The family will be astonished to see us,” said Kurt, 
so anxious to hurry forward that he could scarcely keep 
step with his friend. 

Cigarette only nodded. From the last large town at 
which they had stayed, he had written secretly to Meister 
Fridolin, giving the day and probable hour of their re- 
turn ; but he did not wish to cloud the boy ’s happy mood 
by reminding him that all parents, especially mothers, 
hate surprises, and need time to prepare the fatted calf, 
if they are to welcome the homing prodigal, according to 
their heart’s desire. 

As the familiar gables and chimney-tops came in sight, 
Kurt’s excited chatter sank into sudden silence. His 
mind was busy with a thousand memories; for, here on 
the outskirts of the little town, every step of the way 
recalled some long-forgotten incident of his boyhood. 
On he went, arm in arm with his companion, through the 
crooked streets, past the overhanging houses, along the 


The Return Home 


87 


sheer rock wall of the old castle, and out at last into 
the market-place, where the fountain was plashing in its 
stone basin under the staring eyes of the battered Saint 
on his pillar, just as it had plashed over a year ago, on 
the day when Cigarette first sat there, eating his black 
bread and dozing in the warm summer sun. 

Now, as then, it was high noon ; the townspeople were 
all at dinner or asleep; the Rath-Haus square and the 
shadowy arcades surrounding it were quiet and deserted. 

Unable to master his impatience any longer, Kurt 
broke away from his comrade, and running on ahead, 
disappeared around a corner. 

Cigarette let him go. He was wise with an experience 
of many such home-comings, and loitered purposely far 
behind, walking slowly, and slower still, as he turned 
into the street that led to the Wiegands’ house. 

At last, in spite of all this deliberate delay, he reached 
the last winding of the lane. 

And lifting his eyes, he saw the open door of the little 
shoemaker’s shop, and Kurt in his mother’s arms. 

Cigarette turned aside to look into a bookseller’s win- 
dow. What volumes were set out there he could not tell, 
for he did not see very clearly ; even the tallest type was 
blurred ; and there was a tight feeling in his throat that 
boded no good. He could not face Fridolin like this. 

He was fighting back the tears that dimmed his eyes 
when he heard at his elbow a soft clear voice. 

“Signore, . . . Signore buonissimo, . . . behold, we 
have come out to bid you welcome, my son and I.” 

Turning his head, he met Giulia’s quiet happy eyes, 
and found himself gazing down into a tiny round brown 
face that lay close to the little mother’s shoulder. She 
held out her hand. And Cigarette, sweeping off his hat, 
saluted the tips of her fingers. i 

Giulia led him towards the house. The door-way was 
empty now; but as he passed into the shadow of the 
broad lintel, he was enfolded in a pair of mighty arms 
that pressed him firmly against a pitch-stained leathern 
apron until he gasped for breath. 

“God’s Greeting to thee, dear friend. God’s Greeting, 


88 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


ten hundred thousand times , 9 ’ thundered Fridolin ’s deep 
bass. He held his guest for a moment at arm’s length, 
and then crushed him once more to his leathern bosom. 

“And thou art satisfied?” panted Cigarette between 
the Meister’s hugs. 

“Satisfied?” roared Fridolin, pointing to a corner of 
the room, where Kurt stood between his mother and sis- 
ter. ‘ ‘ I gave thee a spoiled puppy, and thou hast 
brought me back a man. May all the Saints be praised. ’ ’ 

Frau Wiegand looked as if she too longed to embrace 
Cigarette; but something in his face made her pause, 
and with a deep curtsey she kissed his hand. 

Then Coelestino came forward, thrilling with a father ’s 
pride, blushing and bowing, while Cigarette made him 
magnificent Italian compliments on the beauty of his 
wife and the health of his off -spring. 

“We have been here almost two months, ’ ’ he explained. 
“And the Maestro Fridolin has found me work. We 
had no trouble in slipping out of Naples, for the Camorra 
was too busy with its own affairs to bother itself about 
such small fish as Giulia and myself. That double mur- 
der of Blanco and the priest got into the foreign papers ; 
the people in Rome woke up a bit ; and since then Naples 
has fairly swarmed with Carabinieri, so that the Honor- 
able Society has fallen upon very evil days. ’ ’ 

He began an excited description of his journey north- 
wards, but Frau Wiegand interrupted him. Like all 
good German housewives, she considered eating the chief 
end of man ; and besides, she had been keeping the dinner 
warm for hours. 

‘ ‘ Darf ich bitten zum Speisen ? ” 1 said she with a 
touch of severity in her voice that implied an instant 
command. 

“ Ja, mutter, das darfst du,” cried Fridolin, and threw 
his leathern apron aside. 

The table had been set in the brightest comer of the 
low-roofed room; and the guests took their places close 

1 “Darf ich bitten” &c. : “May I ask you to come to dinner ?” 

“Ja, mutter,” &c.: “Yes, mother, that you may.” 


The Return Home 


89 


to one another on the two long wooden benches built 
into the wall, leaving the farther side of the table free 
for the comings and goings of Frau Wiegand and her 
flaxen-haired daughter. 

Never before in Meister Fridolin’s house had there 
been such as “ Essen.” And yet to his good-wife it 
proved a great disappointment, for every one was so busy 
talking that they almost forgot to eat. Every one ex- 
cept Cigarette. He talked little; but, alas, he ate even 
less. 

At last, Kurt, who was holding his mother’s hand 
under cover of the hanging cloth, grew troubled and 
came hurrying around the table to sit at his friend’s 
side. But even then, although Cigarette tried his best, 
he fell very far below Frau Wiegand ’s ideal of a 
“ healthy feeder.” 

When the last dish had been carried away and Frido- 
lin’s daughter was setting out the best coffee-cups, — the 
blue ones with gold rims that have been family treasures 
for ages, ever since the first Wiegand made his famous 
boots for the Mad Margrade — the old Meister thumped 
on the table with his fist. 

‘ ‘ Silentium, ” he said, with a good-humored scowl at 
his wife, who was still hovering over Kurt, patting his 
shoulder and stroking his hair. “Let the boy alone, 
mother. Thou wilt have enough time to-morrow and 
next day for all thy questions. What we want now is 
to hear the voice of my dear friend and comrade. He 
used to be a teller of tales such as few could equal. And, 
as the proverb says, after a good meal a good story.” 

“A story!” murmured the shy flaxen-haired daughter 
ecstatically. 

“A story about himself,” suggested Coelestino; and 
Frau Wiegand was overcome by such a sudden fit of sup- 
pressed laughter that she spilled the Meister ’s coffee, for 
Stino’s pronunciation of the German tongue was a won- 
der beyond words. 

“And about the great lady whom he loved,” added 
Giulia softly, leaning back against Stino’s shoulder. 


90 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


Cigarette shook his head defiantly. 

“Let Kurt do the talking,” he said. “He can tell of 
our adventures far better than I.” 

But to this the others would not agree. 

‘ ‘ Please, . . . please, ’ ’ begged Kurt, throwing an arm 
around Cigarette’s neck. “Most of thy tales I have 
heard already. But of thyself I know so little. And 
I’ve never bothered thee before. All this whole year 
I’ve scarcely ever asked a question or tried to find out 
what ” 

“My son,” growled Meister Fridolin, interrupting 
Kurt with another thump of his fist on the table. “My 
son, hast thou no manners? This good friend of ours 
has been God’s Providence to thee as he was once to 
me also. And to God’s Providence, one does not put 
impertinent questions. To pry into things that do not 
concern ’ ’ 

“Let be, Meister,” interposed Cigarette. “The chil- 
dren shall have their story. I fear, though, that it will 
not prove a merry one. But even so, we must not let it 
make us sad, because it’s only a fairy-tale after all.” 

“Ma Signore,” objected Coelestino, “it was about 
yourself, not about fairies, that we wished to hear. ’ ’ 

“Idiot, mine, it will be all the same thing,” whispered 
Giulia with quick intuition. 

Cigarette leaned back against the wall, his mass of 
black hair resting on the yellow wainscot, just below 
the foot of the great crucifix in the corner; his one arm 
around Kurt’s neck, and his other hand hugged tightly 
within the Meister ’s enormous fist. Below Kurt was 
Giulia, cuddling close to Coelestino with her sleeping 
baby ; while on the farther side of the table sat the placid 
house-wife and her flaxen-haired daughter, motionless in 
the shadow. 

“This,” Cigarette began, “is the story of a King’s 
Son. ’ ’ 

“A King’s Son!” repeated Giulia reverently under 
her breath. 

‘ ‘ For all the difference that it would make in my tale, ’ ’ 
Cigarette answered, “you might call him a Woman’s 


The Return Home 


91 


Son. But Kings’ Sons are so much more plentiful . . . 
in fairy stories.” 


THE STORY OF THE KING’S SON AND HIS GOOD DEED . 1 

Once upon a time there was a King’s Son who longed 
to do a Good Deed. He was not content with simply 
sitting still in that state of life to which it had pleased 
God to call him ; he wanted to make the world better for 
his living in it. “If I cannot do that,” he said to him- 
self, “what is the use of having a King for a father?” 
This Desire burned warm in his Heart; and sometimes, 
when he thought of all the pain and of all the injustice 
in the world, his whole breast seemed to be on fire with 
a Great Flame of Pity. And then he suffered very much 
indeed. 

As soon as he came of age he determined to begin 
doing Good; so he asked of his father permission to 
travel. This was readily granted him, for the King had 
other Sons at home, more than enough to wear all the 
uniforms and to lay all the corner-stones that His Maj- 
esty had not time to wear or to lay himself. 

The Prince set out on his journey. He was very 
happy; he knew that he was going to make the world 
better; and the Flame in his Breast didn’t hurt him as 
much as usual. But soon it began to burn fiercely again ; 
for he heard the people of the country groaning under 
the taxes, complaining of unjust judges, and saying un- 
pleasant things about the King, his father. He was 
eager to help them. And yet, whenever he tried, they 
looked at him most disagreeably. The poorer people 
were suspicious and rude. “What has a King’s son got 
to do with the Likes of Us?” they said. Others were 
offended; they thought that a Prince’s business was to 

i Note . — The story of Cigarette’s Good Deed was suggested to 
me by a fairy-tale or “Maerchen” that I read in a German news- 
paper some years ago. The writer’s name, as well as the name 
of the paper, I am unable to ascertain. I wish, however, to ac- 
knowledge my indebtedness . — The Author. 


92 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


wear orders and to open bazaars, and that he wasn’t 
minding it properly. “What do we pay your father 
for?” they asked. Even when the Prince concealed his 
real name and offered his help, both rich and poor 
shrugged their shoulders and said that he had better 
leave things as they were. The world was bad enough, 
but the meddling of inexperienced young enthusiasts 
would only make it worse. 

“I talk too much,” thought the Prince. “I mustn’t 
wait for people’s permission. The only way to quench 
the Flame of my Desire and get rid of this warm chok- 
ing feeling in my breast is to take hold, whenever I see 
a Good Deed waiting to be done, and just do it. ’ ’ 

He looked about him in the world, found it all very 
hopeless, and, as he was a religious sort of a Prince, soon 
made up his mind that the very Best Deed of All must 
be to help people out of this world into heaven. So he 
wrapped up his cloth-of-gold Coat, his Crown, and his 
Jeweled Sword carefully in brown paper, took the pack- 
age under his arm, and went to a House, where a great 
number of Holy men lived, serving God day and night. 
He knocked at the gate, and told the porter that he 
wanted to be made into a priest. 

The Holy Men were very much pleased; they had 
never had a King’s Son in their House before. But 
when the Prince refused to put on his Crown and be 
shown off to the blue-nosed old ladies and the sharp-faced 
sly-eyed young men who came on Sundays to visit the 
Father Superior, the good Monks stopped smiling at him 
in the corridors on their way to dinner. And when he 
actually refused to have his true name appear in a little 
story about “A Pious Prince” that was to be printed in 
a Catholic Family Paper, owned by a rich Jew, the Fa- 
ther Superior himself began to doubt whether such a 
selfish young person could really be called of God to the 
Office and Dignity of the Priesthood. 

Yet the King’s Son was not discouraged; his Heart 
was all aglow with the thought of showing people how 
to get into heaven, and he studied very hard to find out 
the right way. 


The Return Home 


93 


It did not seem to him as if the Professors, whose 
lectures he heard, made it exactly easy for people to 
come near to God. They set up so many barriers that 
narrowed the road. The Professors called these Barriers 
Dogmas; and although the King’s Son knew that most 
of them were necessary as Sign-Posts on the Way, lest 
travelers should miss the Great High-Road and wander 
off into winding lanes that lead nowhither, yet he didn ’t 
like to see a Sign-Post magnified into an Impassible 
Fence, and he worried a good deal over the matter. The 
Professors, however, said that the Fences were all Com- 
ponent Parts of God’s Revelation to Mankind, and the 
Prince tried to believe them. 

But one day he made an astonishing discovery; he 
came across a Dogma that wasn ’t Necessary. He thought 
and he reasoned and he thought again until he was per- 
fectly sure that, without it, the Road to Heaven would 
still be safe. And when he realized this, the Flame in 
his Heart leaped up, and, instead of searing him, warmed 
him through and through. For here was a Good Deed 
that he had done! He had cleared aside an old Sign- 
Post that had outlasted its usefulness and had fallen 
across the Road, blocking the way for many people, who 
would now see the path stretching free before them, and 
could walk up, . . . and up, . . . without hindrance, 
... to the very Throne of God. 

His eyes alight with this new joy, the King’s Son 
hurried to his Professor and told him of his Wonderful 
Discovery. But the old priest was very cross indeed. 

4 ‘That is heresy,” he scolded. 

And when the Prince explained how great was his 
Desire to make it easier for people to get into heaven, 
the Professor answered that such an undertaking was 
None of His Business. 

“God will attend to that,” he said. 

‘ ‘ It looks as if nobody else would, ’ ’ replied the Prince. 
1 1 And, apparently, I ’m not the right person to help Him, 
So I must seek my Good Deed elsewhere.” 

Then all the Professors in the House began talking at 
once. They argued with the Prince; they showed l*im 


94 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


how important it was that the Way to Eternal Life 
should be hard and narrow ; and they pointed out that a 
Priest wasn’t a Pathfinder, but only a sort of a Guide, 
licensed for One Road and for no other. But the Prince 
was too disappointed by the loss of his Good Deed to 
listen to all that they said. He tossed his black cassock 
aside, got out the brown-paper parcel that held his Crown 
and Sword, and set forth into the world again. As soon 
as he had gone, the Father Superior told the blue-nosed 
old ladies and the sharp-faced, sly-eyed young men who 
came to visit him on Sundays that the King’s Son was 
not only worldly-minded, but secretly licentious as well, 
and that the Professors had been compelled, much against 
their will, to ask him to leave their House, lest he should 
injure the other students by his evil example. 

Kind people carried the Father Superior’s words to 
the Prince’s ears; but he didn’t mind; he had so much 
else to think about, for at first things went badly with 
him. It was hard to get used to his cloth-of-gold Coat 
that he had put on once more ; the Crown made his head 
ache; he kept stumbling over the long jeweled Sword; 
and after his peaceful life in the Monks’ House, the 
world seemed even more hideous than before, so full of 
unhappiness and pain that the Flame in his Heart 
burned angrily, and he could scarcely breathe, it hurt 
him so. But worst of all was the filth and the degrading 
wickedness that pressed upon him from every side. He 
began to wish that he might die, for he loved Purity and 
all things clean. 

It happened one evening that he was walking through 
a shadowy silent wood, and when darkness came on he 
lost his way. The ground under foot was swampy, and 
often quite hidden by low-lying grayish patches of foul 
heavy mist. There were snakes in the thicket too; all 
manner of abominable Hidden Things rustled and hissed 
under cover of the night; and the evilness of the place 
weighed like lead on the Prince ’s heart. But he straight- 
ened the golden Crown on his yellow hair, and he girded 
still tighter the broad belt that held his jeweled Sword, 
and he said to himself, “This spot is full of vileness. 


The Return Home 


95 


But I am a King’s Son; nothing evil can happen to me, 
because I love what is clean. And, perhaps, it is just 
here that I shall find a chance for my Good Deed. ’ ’ 

By-and-by, as he pushed forward through the under- 
brush, he came upon a muddy little lake. He was tired 
out, so he lay down on a strip of dry ground under a 
great leafless tree. But he could not sleep. The Evil 
Things around him stirred in the bushes, and drops of 
warm filthy water fell upon him from the withered 
branches, staining his golden Crown and dimming the 
bright stones in the hilt of his Sword. This he would 
not suffer. He unbuckled his broad belt, and drawing 
out the Damascus blade, began to cleanse the jeweled 
handle from the fetid dew. 

While he was bending over his work, the dark waters 
of the pool at his feet were suddenly touched with silver, 
and above the black bare trees rose the summer’s moon, 
a glory of clean whiteness in the midst of the evil swamp. 
The Prince looked up. 

And there, in the midst of the morass, he saw a Lotus- 
Flower that stretched out her petals like beckoning arms, 
white as the moonbeams, beautiful and pure. 

“Oh, what unsullied innocence!” thought the King’s 
Son. “How terrible that it should be compelled to 
breathe the air of this hideous forest! See how she 
reaches out towards me with her petals! She longs, I 
know, to be released. She is calling me. Why here, 
ready to my hand, is a Good Deed. I will pluck the 
White Lotus from the slime; I will take her away from 
this evil place, and will warm her leaves against the 
Flame that burns in my Heart. ’ ’ 

So he left his jeweled belt and his unsheathed Sword 
beneath the tree, and walked down to the edge of the 
little pool. 

‘ ‘ Bless my goggle eyes ! ’ ’ croaked a Big Fat Frog, who 
was sitting on a lily-pad. “What’s all this, I’d like to 
know ? ’ ’ 

“I’m looking for a boat, ’ ’ answered the Prince, with a 
polite bow. 

The Frog gurgled disdainfully. 


96 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 

“No boats here. People who want anything out of 
the swamp must wade into it. What are you after ?” 

“That White Lotus,” cried the Prince. “I’m going 
to warm her against my breast. A foul spot like this is 
no fit place for such as she.” 

The Big Fat Frog said nothing, but he laughed so 
heartily that he fell plump off the lily-pad, and his 
chuckles came up through the water in booming yellow 
bubbles. 

The Prince began wading into the pool. 

Then an Old Owl, who had her nest in the dead tree 
beneath which the Prince had lain down to sleep, called 
out in a harsh voice — 

“Fool, . . . fool, . . . have you asked her, . . . have 
you asked her ? Does she want you to carry her off from 
the swamp?” 

“She hasn’t said so exactly,” replied the Prince, try- 
ing hard to keep his temper. ‘ 1 But any one can see that 
this isn’t the proper place for such an innocent ” 

“Let her alone. . . . Let her alone,” interrupted the 
rude Old Owl, who was a person of some worldly experi- 
ence. “What grows from the slime belongs in the slime. 
Let her alone, . . . fool, . . . fool!” 

But the Prince only waded farther in. 

His beautiful shoes of green leather sank deep into the 
clinging mud; the foul water closed over his bright red 
silken hose; and round his limbs there swam all sorts of 
hideous creatures that nipped at his shrinking flesh, while 
huge bats circled about his shoulders, tearing with their 
sharp claws at his cloth-of-gold coat and brushing his 
yellow hair with their unclean wings. Yet the Prince 
made no complaint. The Flame in his Heart burned 
softly, and warmed his chilled body. Was he not going 
to release the White Lotus from her bondage, and do his 
Good Deed at last? 

He was within reach of the flower now. How wonder- 
ful she was ! Even more wonderful than she had seemed 
from the shore! He put out his hand; he touched her. 

Alas, her petals were icy cold, and from their depths 
rose a heavy scent, distressing and repellant. 


The Return Home 


97 


Poor thing ! ’ ’ thought the Prince. ‘ ‘ She has suffered 
from her evil environment. How could it be otherwise ? 
But we shall soon change all that.” 

And he bent over the White Lotus with outstretched 
arms, so great was his longing to draw her closer, and to 
warm her cold petals at the Flame in his Heart. 

But as he stooped, the golden Crown slipped from his 
hair, and disappeared in the dark water. 

Now he could never return to his kingdom again ; for 
who would recognize him without his crown? He had 
lost his right to be acclaimed as a King ’s Son. 

“Never mind,” he said out loud. “Crown or no 
Crown, I am a King’s Son. And what would a man not 
sacrifice to help this beautiful unhappy flower?” 

He plunged his hands deep down into the thick muddy 
water. The stem of the White Lotus was oozy with slime, 
and when he tried to break it off short, the fibers slipped 
through his fingers. So he took a firmer hold and tugged 
with all his might. 

“For heaven’s sake, young man,” shrieked the flower, 
“what are you doing? You surely don’t intend to root 
me out of this swamp ? ’ ’ 

The King’s Son bit his lip until the blood flowed down 
his trembling chin. The Fire in his Heart began to hurt 
him grievously with a sudden fierce burning. 

“But I’ve come to release you,” he stammered. 
“Didn’t you call me? I thought you did.” 

“Oh, yes, that’s true enough,” answered the White 
Lotus, “only you were different then. You had a golden 
Crown on your head; and that jeweled Sword of yours 
glittered so splendidly at your side in the moonlight. I 
do adore precious stones. . . . But now ; see what a con- 
dition you’re in. Your face is bloody, and you’re all 
dirty too. How could I know that you really looked like 
this?” 

The Prince felt his knees bend beneath him. 

“Oh, come, . . . come with me,” he pleaded. And it 
seemed as if the evil air of the place were adding fresh 
fuel to the leaping scorching Flame in his breast. “It 
was for your sake that I soiled myself so. It was for 


98 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


you that I risked my life in this swamp and lost my 
golden Crown. I’ve nothing left but you. Oh, be kind 
to me, and come. ’ ’ 

“I don’t admire people who have nothing left,” an- 
swered the Lotus. ‘ ‘ Must you be going so soon ? Good- 
night. ’ ’ 

And she folded her leaves tightly together. 

The Big Fat Frog, who had climbed back on to his 
lily-pad, began to laugh again. He laughed and 
croaked; then he croaked and laughed. He was very 
much amused. 

‘ * Hoo-o ! hoo-o ! Down with the Aristocracy, ’ ’ hooted 
the worldly-wise Old Owl from the dark branches of the 
rotting tree. “What business has a Prince in a swamp 
with a Lotus-Flower? He’s an ass: that’s what he is. 
While he’s been fooling around in the water a thief has 
run off with his jeweled belt. Serve him right ! . . . But 
all princes are asses. That’s why all owls are repub- 
licans. Hoo-o ! Hoo-o ! Intellect is the only true No- 
bility ! ’ ’ 

The Prince made his way slowly to the bank. The Old 
Owl’s keen eyes had not seen amiss; both belt and jeweled 
scabbard were gone. But the steel Damascus blade lay 
on the ground where the thief had dropped it in his flight. 

The King’s Son balanced the naked sword in his hand. 

“Steel is better than jewels or gold,” said the Owl, who 
really had a hopeless weakness for princes. “So cheer 
up. At least, you can fight your way back to your king- 
dom.” 

“Fight?” answered the Prince sadly. “I came out 
to do a Good Deed, not to fight. And anyway, nothing 
makes any difference now.” 

Catching the sword by its point he whirled it round 
and round, although it cut his fingers to the bone, and 
then flung it from him in flashing circles to join his 
golden Crown near the roots of the White Lotus at the 
bottom of the muddy pool. 

Cigarette’s voice faltered. He withdrew his hand 
from the old Meister’s grasp, smoothed back his mass 


The Return Home 99 

of black hair, and, bending forwards, crossed his arms 
before’ him on the table. 

A shining drop from Giulia’s long sweeping lashes 
splashed down on her baby’s peaceful little face. She 
had understood more than Stino of Cigarette’s simple 
German, and, when knowledge failed her, her quick ear 
for the changing tones in the speaker’s voice helped her 
to the meaning of his story. 

“Ah, poverino,” she whispered. “Poverino! Ah, 
che peccato. ” 

Cigarette went on, his eyes fixed on the thread-bare 
edges of his coat-sleeve. 


The King’s Son came out of the wood poor and 
alone. He had lost all the outward signs of his son- 
ship ; and soon his red silken hose grew so ragged, his 
cloth-of-gold Coat so shiny at the seams that he looked 
little better than a beggar. Yet for all that he was 
still a Prince; he had, or he thought he had, the royal 
stamp and carriage which nothing can quite destroy ; and 
he supposed that people would recognize him at once as 
the son of a King. But they didn’t. And after a while 
he ceased to care. It was enough that he himself knew 
what blood ran in his veins. You see, he was not free 
from the great Sin of Pride. 

For many years he wandered in as many lands, seek- 
ing always his One Desire, his Good Deed, that men 
should recognize as good because it made the world a 
little brighter; but he never found it; and at length he 
came by chance into a far country where Money is the 
only King, and where there are no King’s Sons, since 
“The People” wear all the uniforms themselves and 
prefer, strangely enough, to open their own bazaars. 
Yet, like other rulers, Money seemed to have had his 
faults; there was much discontent in the land, and its 
inhabitants were seriously considering the advisability of 
dethroning their sovereign and putting Honesty or even 
Stupidity in his place. 

Now the Prince was passing through an amazingly 


100 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


great town of this same country, when suddenly he felt 
the ground begin to tremble beneath his feet; the high 
buildings tottered ; walls crumbled away like paper ; and 
fire broke out on every side. He stopped among a crowd 
of gaping onlookers in front of a burning house. 

The firemen loitered idly about, carrying coils of empty 
hose, and unable to check the flames, for the Town Coun- 
cilors, instead of building reservoirs, had put the taxes 
into their pockets, and there was no water in the mains. 
And so the house of an Unfortunate Citizen was going 
to ruin because the government authorities had been 
faithful to Money, the King of their land. 

In the midst of the crowd stood the Unfortunate Citi- 
zen himself, wailing aloud, wringing his hands, and be- 
moaning his hard lot. 

“I have labored honestly,’ ’ he cried. “I have de- 
frauded no man, and yet I must end my days as a 
wretched pauper. There is no water to quench the fire ; 
and I, oh miserable fool, was too avaricious to waste a 
penny on the insurance of my property. All is lost, — 
all. Even my strong-box, with the hoarding of years, 
that stands in my bedroom and that I had not time to 
save. I am ruined, — poor, — a beggar. Let me rather 
perish in the same flames with my wealth, since life with- 
out it can have no happiness for me.” 

The King’s Son listened eagerly. 

“Loyalty,” he thought, “is a trait of character that 
every right-minded Prince should esteem. King Money 
has taken the water from the mains; he has ruined 
this Unfortunate Citizen, and yet the fellow is true 
to his old allegiance still. I will save him from a joyless 
poverty. Perhaps this is my Good Deed.” 

In the Prince’s breast the Flame of Desire, that had 
been burning low, leaped into brightness once more. 
He forgot the danger, the staring firemen, the crowd 
of onlookers, and dashed into the burning house. He 
fought his way upstairs, found the money-box, and 
rushed down into the street again, his heart singing with- 
in him. 

His Good Deed ! . . . His Good Deed ! 


The Return Home 


101 


As he staggered out of the smoke, a heavy hand 
dropped on his shoulder ; a clenched fist struck him on the 
mouth. 

“Thief !” cried one voice. 

‘ ‘ Plunderer ! — Ghoul ! ’ ’ yelled another. ‘ ‘ Shoot him ! ’ ’ 

The maddened crowd tore the box from his hands, 
and beat him brutally with their sticks until he fled 
for his life, and escaped, he knew not how, through the 
ruined streets. His face and arms were covered with 
burns; he dragged himself outside the city to a spring 
by the roadside, and, as he was bathing his wounds, he 
saw himself reflected in the clear motionless pool. All 
his beautiful silken hair, of which he had been so proud, 
the golden hair that had so often reminded him of his 
lost Crown and that seemed to mark him still as a King’s 
Son, had been singed away by the flames. There was 
nothing left but a few matted whisps that dangled, black 
and hideous, about his scarred, disfigured face. 

He was not a pretty sight now. So he slunk along the 
byeways and wandered slowly back towards his own land. 

It was a weary journey. As he drew near his father’s 
kingdom, but was still within the boundaries of a neigh- 
boring monarch, at whose court he had often ridden to 
joust all sheathed in golden armor, he came upon a tiny 
country village. It was Sunday — a peaceful sunny 
morning in early May. At the door of an ivy-covered 
cottage sat a very old woman, with a young girl stand- 
ing at her side holding a cup of steaming soup. The 
girl was impatient and cross ; and when the old grandam, 
in trying to raise the cup to her quivering lips, dropped 
it from her unsteady blue-veined hands and broke it to 
bits on the stone floor of the porch, she flew into a pas- 
sion, shook the helpless woman roughly, cuffed and 
scolded her, and rapped her over the thin knuckles with 
a heavy leaden spoon. Then she went away ... to 
church. 

As soon as she was gone, the Prince stole nearer, and 
heard the old dame mumbling to herself. 

“I’m no use to any one. My granddaughter hates me 
because she’s kept tied to my side. My son-in-law hates 


102 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


me too, because he can’t get hold of the little money that 
I ’ve laid by. I can ’t walk, or hear, or see. I can ’t even 
die. I’m nothing but a nuisance and a burden to the 
people I love. Oh, if death would only come! What a 
blessing for everybody, . . . what a rest at last for 
me!” 

The Flame in the Prince’s Heart began to glow again, 
and, stepping up to the old dame ’s chair, he spoke kindly 
to her, bidding her take comfort and be glad of the warm 
sun and of God’s beautiful world. But she could not 
hear his words of comfort, or see the beautiful world 
of which he told her. She did not even know that be- 
side her chair stood a King’s Son. She could only weep, 
and pray that she might die. 

“God is gracious to me at last,” sighed the Prince. 
“Here is the Good Deed for which I have sought so 
long. ’ ’ 

And taking from his breast the leaves of a poisonous 
plant which he had once gathered in a mood of bitter 
despair, he dropped them into the hollow gourd that he 
carried about his neck, filled the gourd with water, and 
gave the old woman to drink. Then he sat down at her 
felt, and stroked her swollen trembling hands until they 
ceased to tremble and grew cold. 

He was still sitting there when the young girl came 
back from the church. 

“We never give anything to beggars,” she scolded. 
‘ ‘ What are you doing on our porch ? ’ ’ 

“A Good Deed,” answered the Prince, with a happy 
laugh. “Though you don’t give, I do. I’ve given her 
what she longed for. She is dead.” 

The girl touched the old woman’s white motionless 
face. Then she shook down her hair, and began to scream 
so shrilly that all the people in the village ran out of their 
houses and gathered about her with open mouths. 

“He has killed my grandmother,” she cried, pointing 
to the Prince. “My own dear beloved Granny! The 
best, the most patient grandmother in the world ! ’ ’ 

“My sainted mother-in-law,” sobbed a fat pig-faced 
man. ‘ ‘ This wretch has poisoned her. ’ ’ 


The Return Home 103 

“Murderer! — Murderer!” the whole village shouted 
together. 

They held the Prince fast, striking at him and spitting 
in his face, until the police came, and he was carried off 
to prison, loaded with chains. 

He was kept in prison many, many years. When he 
was set at liberty once more, he was old and broken. 
The last locks of his golden hair had disappeared long 
since ; and now, about his forehead and around his mouth 
there hovered that strange drawn expression which marks 
the features of every one who has ever eaten out his 
heart behind iron bars, so that people know him instantly 
as a released criminal; and whenever he tried to talk 
with them, longing for a kindly word after so many years 
of prison silence, they turned their back and gave no 
answer to his timid greetings. Even the little children 
ran off the moment they saw him coming. And this hurt 
him most of all. For he loved children. 

Yet One Thing about him remained unchanged — his 
Eyes. They still gleamed with his Great Desire, and, 
although it was becoming harder and harder for him 
to find a chance for his Good Deed, the Flame in his 
Heart was still unquenched. 

“I’m getting old,” he thought. “If I’m ever to do 
my Good Deed, I must lose no time about it. ’ ’ 

So he started out bravely once again, walking towards 
his own country. But he was weaker than he knew; 
and one day, just after he had crossed the border, he 
fell in a faint by the roadside, for he had eaten nothing 
since the morning before. He had no time to eat. 

Some passing peasant picked him up and carried him 
to the Charity Hospital that his own father had founded 
in the chief city of the kingdom. 

He was put into the Beggars’ Ward. And while he 
lay there Death peeped over the foot of the bed. 

“What was all that nonsense about a Good Deed?” 
asked Death. “I hope you’re old enough to know better 
now. Aren ’t you almost ready to come with me!” 

“Not quite,” answered the Prince. “I haven’t done 
my Good Deed yet. At least, I’ve done nothing that 


104 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


anybody ever thought was good, or thanked me for 
doing. ’ ’ 

“You’ll have to wait a long time for that, my dear,” 
sneered Death. “Better give up trying and come along. 
I ’ll make it easy for you. ’ ’ 

1 1 No, ’ ’ said the King ’s Son resolutely. ‘ ‘ Not yet. ’ ’ 

So Death went away, and the King’s Son lay there 
in the Beggars’ Ward, waiting. 

Waiting for what? He could not quite tell. Only 
it did not seem possible that he could die without fulfil- 
ing the One Great Desire of his life. Month followed 
month. He got no worse; neither was he any better. 
Other patients recovered and went away; others were 
carried out to the Potter’s Field; but he still lay there 
in the Beggars’ Ward, waiting patiently. No one came 
to visit him; he had nothing to read; and even the hos- 
pital nurses grew tired of tending the old man. They 
began to neglect him, and often forgot to brush away the 
hard bread crumbs from between the hot creased sheets. 

The snow settled down on the streets outside : it was 
Christmas time. And late on the night before the Great 
Feast, the King’s Son felt that his grasp on life was 
loosening fast ; he could hold on no longer. He sent for 
a priest. And by-and-bye the priest came. It was the 
same Father Superior of that Holy Men’s House, where 
the Prince had once discovered the Unnecessary Dogma ; 
but he did not recognize the scarred face on the hospital 
pillow. How could he ? His eyes were heavy with sleep ; 
he was in a great hurry, and grumbled all the time be- 
cause he had been called out in the middle of the night. 
But when he had heard the dying man’s confession, and 
had strengthened him for the Long Journey with the 
Body of Christ, his eyes grew red around the edges, and 
he went away, staggering blindly and beating upon his 
breast with his hands. 

The King’s Son was glad to be alone again, and he 
lay motionless, his arms crossed on his breast, listening 
to the drip-drip-drip of the melting snow outside. It 
sounded to him like the drops of blood that were falling, 
one by one, from his tired heart. 


The Return Home 


105 


Yet his heart still beat; the old fire still burned there; 
he felt the warm glow within his breast, and he knew 
that it was only this Flame of his Great Desire that kept 
the last drop of his life’s blood from dripping away like 
the rest. Oh, if he could but find his Good Deed before 
he died ; the Good Deed that he had sought so long. 

He began to pray. 

And as he prayed, the Flame in his Heart leaped up 
and shone through the lids of his closed eyes. 

At five o’clock on Christmas morning a New Nurse 
came on duty. She and the Night Nurse made a round 
of the ward together, and stopped beside the bed where 
the King’s Son lay. And because his eyes were shut, 
and they themselves had never learned to see, they did 
not know that he was a King’s Son. They thought that 
the old beggar was asleep. 

‘ ‘ He ’s a perfect nuisance, ’ ’ said the Night Nurse. ‘ 1 If 
he’d only get to work and die, he’d do a good deed that 
we’d all be grateful for. . . . Well, I’m off to bed. A 
Merry Christmas to you. ’ ’ 

The King’s Son opened his eyes. The Light of his 
Great Desire flashed up in them with a sudden joyous 
radiance. He sighed. Then his eyes closed again, and 
the Flame in his Heart went out for ever. 


Cigarette leaned forwards, and laid his head on his 
folded arms. 

Unbroken stillness spread like a noiseless wave into 
every corner of the little low-roofed room, and no one 
moved, until, with a quick shake of his broad shoulders, 
Cigarette sat up again and smiled. 

Still no one spoke. 

Then Giulia, reaching across the corner of the table 
from her place at Stino’s side, laid her warm palm over 
Cigarette’s clasped hands. 

“Much I have not understood,” she said in her soft 
Italian. “But of one thing we people of the south are 
always sure. Wine maketh the heart glad, and a flame 
does not go out so long as there is oil to feed it. And 


106 The Six-Pointed Cross in the Dust 


here is the Wine and the Oil of Love, Signore ; . . . and 
here, . . . and here, . . . and here.” 

She touched her own breast with her left hand, and 
in her quick expressive gesture flung out her five wide- 
spread fingers towards Coelestino, towards Kurt, towards 
the old Meister, his good wife, and their flaxen-haired 
daughter. 

“And do thou, Kurt,” she added, “make my speech 
plain to thy father. ’ ’ 

Kurt obeyed. The old Meister listened eagerly; he 
opened his mouth to speak, stammered, hesitated, and 
then, stretching out his hard broad hand, laid it on top 
of Giulia’s, that was still clasped around Cigarette’s 
locked fingers. 

“ Ja-ja,” 1 he said at last, slowly. “ Ja, recht hatt sie. 
So ist es ; genau so. ” 

And before Cigarette could move his arms from the 
table, his hands were completely hidden beneath Coeles- 
tino ’s short fingers, Kurt’s brown fist, and the timid 
palms of the two other women. With a gentle pull he 
tried to free himself, ashamed of the tears that -were 
running down his cheeks. But Giulia, Stino, and the 
Meister held him fast, while Kurt, seizing his mother’s 
handkerchief, rubbed it clumsily over his friend’s tear- 
stained face. 

“Have a care,” cried Cigarette. “Thou art putting 
out my eyes.” 

“Ah, spare the eyes,” said the good-wife, speaking for 
the first time. “They were all that was left to the 
King’s Son.” 

“But they are enough,” answered Kurt. “More than 
enough. Who should know that better than I ? ” 

Old Meister Fridolin nodded a solemn assent. 

Then, standing up with his face lifted towards the 
great wooden crucifix on the wall, he repeated the 
ancient Grace-after-Meat ; and, when the others had said 
Amen, reached behind him for his long after-dinner 
pipe. Deliberately he filled the painted porcelain bowl, 

1 “Ja,” &c. “Yes, yes, she’s right. So it is; exactly.” 


The Return Home 


107 


and handed it to Cigarette, with all the stately dignity 
of some powerful patriarch, bestowing upon a distin- 
guished stranger eternal rights of friendship and adop- 
tion at the hearthstone of a chosen people. 

Cigarette bowed. Meister Fridolin lighted another 
smaller pipe ; and, in the cool of the late afternoon, they 
sat at the door of the old house, smoking in silence, side 
by side. 

So Cigarette knew that he had come honle. 







4 


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